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Month: August 2021

YFP 218: How Marina Created a Business in Clinical Herbalism

Posted on by yfpadmin


How Marina Created a Business in Clinical Herbalism

Dr. Marina Buksov discusses her entrepreneurial journey in natural remedies and clinical herbalism.

About Today’s Guest

Dr. Marina Buksov is a registered Doctor of Pharmacy, Health Coach, Clinical Herbalist, and lifelong learner of the Healing Arts. She is the creator of Build Your Holistic Herbal Practice course mentoring other healthcare professionals in clinical herbal as well as business skills. She is also a functional medicine pharmacist as part of PharmToTable telehealth platform.

Marina also offers educational webinars with Radicle Herbs and is a wellness writer for Jejune Magazine. Marina uses her multidisciplinary background to educate patients about the least invasive and most natural methods for healing the spirit-body-mind. Her truly holistic approach helps women embody the best versions of themselves and lovingly celebrate the skin they’re in.

When she is not studying, Marina likes to dance, paint, and tinker with various concoctions (tea blends, meals, DIY projects). She lives with her husband, toddler, and two mischievous kitties in NYC.

Summary

Dr. Marina Buksov, a registered pharmacist, Health Coach, Clinical Herbalist, and lifelong learner of the Healing Arts, joins Tim Ulbrich to discuss her entrepreneurial journey. Marina reveals why she launched her brand and business, some lessons she learned along the way, and how her financial journey has intersected with her business goals.

Upon graduation from pharmacy school, Marina quickly realized that she didn’t feel truly passionate about any one particular area of pharmacy or traditional pharmacy career paths. After connecting with her mentor, she decided to explore alternative medicine. During this time, Marina started working in a Russian-style apothecary that specialized in herbs and supplements. Shortly after, Marina found her way into health coaching, incorporating her alternative medicine training and education from her retail pharmacy experience.

Marina advises other pharmacists who may experience that same sense of not belonging in the profession to explore a variety of areas of pharmacy, connect with mentors, and look for (or create) opportunities to find what and how you resonate with the pharmacy profession even as a practicing pharmacist. Along the way, mentors and coaches have played an integral part in Marina’s business, with financial planning and coaching guiding her ability to take risks with her business while also providing for her future.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Marina, welcome to the show.

Marina Buksov: Hi. Thanks so much, Tim.

Tim Ulbrich: I am really excited to dig into your entrepreneurial journey and start us off by telling us about your journey into becoming a pharmacist.

Marina Buksov: Sure. So my parents are actually both dual majors, you could say, in biology and chemistry. And so they kind of inspired me to go down this road. I always loved chemistry as well. It kind of came naturally to me, I guess because my dad was also a chemistry teacher, even though I was learning chemistry in English and he had learned it in Russian. So we kind of didn’t speak the same language, even though it’s a science. I never really needed the help, but I guess the interest was there, much like it was for him. And so when I was choosing colleges, they kind of just brought up pharmacy and they said, “Hey, this seems like a really lucrative field of study right now that you can look into since you like chemistry and math.” So I kind of decided to try it out with the thinking that if I don’t like it, I could always get out of it. But if I don’t get in now, then I won’t have a Master’s degree in six years and the opportunity was really good. So I ended up applying to a couple of schools, and there weren’t that many pharmacy schools in my area. There were only two, so that narrowed down my choices. And I actually loved it in school. I loved learning about the body, and I learned about the biochemistry and about all the medications but also about the non-pharmacological areas, which is what I specialize in now. So I loved the whole process. So being in pharmacy school but again, when it came time to graduate, I found myself at a loss for where in pharmacy exactly I see myself fitting in. My focus was, again, kind of widespread and I liked a lot of different areas, but I couldn’t see myself doing any one thing. And I chose a variety of diverse rotation settings just to put myself in different experiences, but I still couldn’t see myself doing a fellowship or any other kind of advanced training program or in retail or in hospital. So I was kind of like thinking, what am I going to do after I graduate?

Tim Ulbrich: So you had a lot of interests heading into pharmacy, ultimately went that pathway for the reasons that you mentioned. And I’m not surprised you graduate, I can tell that you’re inherently a learner, you’re interested in lots of different things. You go through your rotations, you’ve got this doctorate degree, but you’re not necessarily feeling like you fit into any “traditional” mold, right, that we often think of of pharmacy graduates, which as I think we’re doing a better job of now in 2021, you know, realizing that there certainly are lots of opportunities. The PharmD is a pathway, in my opinion, to many different opportunities. And we’re going to get to yours here in a moment. But tell us then about the path after pharmacy school. What did you do? And did you find out and ultimately get into something that you found out you love? Or did it just affirm that, you know what, I’m not sure where I’m going to go with this path?

Marina Buksov: Yes, so I guess it’s just taking things step-by-step and one day at a time and seeing what opportunities arise and present themselves. So I did end up going to Midyear to interview for fellowships, but that’s when I realized that I don’t see myself doing neither a residency or a fellowship, even though it’s such a lucrative and competitive field that I feel like, you know, people go into it for maybe the merit of it or the prestige of it, maybe some people are really into it, but I was only seeing like the prestige side of it and I wasn’t really seeing how it was really something I’m personally passionate about, so I decided that wasn’t a good reason to apply. So I turned down the one offer that I had and I instead took another offer from a local pharmacy that was just a plain independent retail pharmacy that I had been working part-time as I was in pharmacy school and like learning the ropes there. So I accepted their position as a pharmacist. I figured this was like a safe step for me, a stepping stone, and from here, I could also do some learning on the side and figure out what I want to do next. And as it turns out, that pharmacy went out of business. Well, not really. But they were selling the pharmacy, so they said, ‘Oh, you know, there’s probably no point in us hiring you because we’re going to be selling the business so then we don’t know what the new owners are going to do.’ So basically, that offer fell through. And I found myself having no idea what to do. But I ended up just spending the summer after graduation and taking the test seeing on social media what opportunities are out there, and I ended up going to another pharmacy to kind of learn the system there and cover for someone. And it turned out a pharmacy next door was looking for a full-time pharmacist. So I happened to just go in there and drop off my resume, and they called me back and they said, “OK, we have a position for you.” And the interesting thing is it wasn’t a full-time in one position. It was kind of split between two stores. And one of the stores was in an area that I had said to myself that I would like to work in before, which is this area of Brooklyn that’s kind of a Russian population area called Brighton Beach next to the beach. And they do a lot of herbal medicine there because Russian medicine, much like Chinese, is very integrative in their approach. So their pharmacies are trained in both herbal medicine and pharmacological medicine and pharmaceutical medicine. So it kind of embodied both of those worlds, and I started my journey there.

Tim Ulbrich: So you’re working in a pharmacy that has more “traditional,” you know, what we think of of the pharmacy and dispensing medications, and then they have this more nontraditional — at least nontraditional in the sense of how we think of pharmacy practice in the U.S. So tell us more about that experience as you’re getting into more of the herbal experience and, you know, what did you learn through that? And how did this position and experience affect your path forward?

Marina Buksov: So it was pretty amazing to see how we have — we’re considered to be masters in our field, right, doctors, actually doctor of pharmacy in our six years of intense schooling, but we really know next to nothing on other types of medicine, anything “alternative” or holistic or complementary. All of that is kind of like if you’re lucky, you get an elective like I did. But otherwise, we don’t know too much. And even the over-the-counter medicines, we don’t go in depth about — again, unless you’re taking a self-care elective. It’s amazing that yes, we pack so much schooling and we come out with so much knowledge but also there’s so much more out there that we don’t know because we don’t know what we don’t know, right? If you just simply don’t know that it’s out there, you won’t even know that you can look for something else, right? So you’ll just rely on the “traditional” things that are conventional and available. So this was kind of like scratching the surface and exposing me to how other countries actually still utilize plant medicine and herbals and many more diverse over-the-counter products than we do. Basically, they’re very, very creative in how people are taking care of themselves from the home and they can go to a pharmacy and get a lot — a bunch of herbs or a bunch of herbal products or a mix between an herbal and a pharmaceutical that’s available without a prescription. And so there’s just so much more to know. And the pharmacists that are trained by, for example, Russian schools or any other kind of country that has this integrative approach, they know maybe not as in-depth as what we know pharmacologically, but they know a lot more about general self-care things that are, again, available to people without going to the doctor and without going to get a prescription. So that was really impressive, and I realized that I also want to know more.

Tim Ulbrich: So Marina, one of the things that I think of and I’ve seen this and heard it from entrepreneurs that have been on this show is that often, some experience that someone has leads to an interest or sparks an idea and then that ultimately will set them off on the path to start something, could be a business, could be a nonproft, could be a side hustle, whatever you want to call it. And before we get into your business, what you’re doing, what you’re working on, I don’t want to gloss over that there is a big jump from experience to idea to actually starting a business. So talk us through that a little bit more in terms of you’re working in this pharmacy, you’re getting this experience, it’s affirming the interests that you have, you’re a learner and you’re absorbing more information. What is the idea or the opportunity that you see that ultimately leads to you starting your business?

Marina Buksov: I mean, I think there were several big factors that were going on, one of which was my personal health journey that has been going on too during this time. And the interesting thing is that now, I — looking back at it — attribute it to psychosomatic things that were happening in my body and my mind and spirit, perhaps, because as I was graduating pharmacy school, I remember described my confusion and not feeling like I fit in anywhere, not knowing if this is actually the path that I should be on, kind of questioning all of that. And I called this my quarter-life crisis that happened because as I chose, you know, the retail position and the retail, as you know, you’re kind of behind the counter and, you know, the most pleasurable activity there was coming out and counseling the patients. But because of the fast pace, even in independent settings, often unless they had questions, counseling wouldn’t really happen.

Tim Ulbrich: Yep.

Marina Buksov: So that was my biggest joy, but unfortunately, I found myself mostly just filling prescriptions and checking things and billing insurances and calling doctors and calling insurances and being behind the counter and not really having the patient-to-patient interaction, which is what my favorite part was. And I started having different kinds of health issues arise from finishing pharmacy school and all through my first years of practice where I had like a worsening in my digestive tract issues that I had growing up, IBS type of things. I was also diagnosed with H. pylori. I had to take a lot of antibiotics. Then I had this obscure dacryostenosis happen in my eyes, which is when your tear ducts basically become more narrow. And so my eyes starting getting chronically inflamed. And at that point, I didn’t even want to come out and see anyone from behind the counter because I felt that I looked horrible with my inflamed eyes. And to top everything off, I also started having PCOS type of symptoms and was diagnosed with it and had lots of acne, which I never had growing up. So it was adult-onset acne and weight gain. And so all of these issues started cropping up when I, again, now, looking back at it, see it tied more to my life purpose and my mission wasn’t really being carried out. And so my health was suffering because of that.

Tim Ulbrich: OK, so Marina, you identify an opportunity to help train others, make other folks aware of some of these practices that, again, could supplement more what we think of traditional medicine. So what does that lead to in terms of your business, your services, what you’re offering, who that’s intended for, and really, what does that look like to solve the problem of which you just described, which is to really help fill what is potentially a gap out there and unawareness and lack of education?

Marina Buksov: Yeah, well, it took some time to distill that exact thought in my entrepreneurial journey. And as I like to say, the entrepreneurial journey is kind of like a forever commitment because you’re always growing. And it’s very much tied to professional growth, the business growth, and your personal growth where your business is a reflection of you and what you’re going through internally. And if you can master your own self, you can master having a business. As I was going along and working in mostly the retail setting, I realized this gap existed, right? So the first step was realizing that there is something I don’t know. So the first thing I need to do is educate myself on that. And then I could kind of draw some other conclusions or learn how to run a business with that perhaps or how to incorporate that into my practice that I already have. So first thing I did was I spoke to my complementary and alternative elective professor, and I asked her what she thinks I should do, and I shared with her how I feel like I don’t fit in and I really did have an interest in that elective. So she suggested I reach out to another person who was a graduate right before me. So when I spoke to her, she suggested that I go into health coaching. So my first program out of college was immediately enrolling in a health coaching program. So after that, I underwent a series of other programs where I learned everything from functional nutrition to eventually clinical herbalism. So how to work with plants and phytochemicals in a way to support the human body. Both nutritionally and medicinally, plants have a huge role in this. And they’re really the basis of both traditional pharmacy and naturopathy and even functional medicine or any supplement that you take out there, they have a basis of some kind of plant behind that. So the minerals and vitamins we extract or the active constituents probably have a root in a plant somewhere.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think, you know, you’re taking me back, Marina, to sometime in pharmacy school. And you’re right. There’s just a lot of connection back to the herbal aspect. And you’re spot-on that traditional PharmD curricula doesn’t necessarily provide much information — really, if at all sometimes, depending on the curriculum — that would allow folks to think about some of the application of this clinically or how some patients might be interested in approaching this. So again, you’ve identified a need, right? We’ve just talked about that. You mentioned about this very much being a journey, which I would agree with. And you’ve sought out additional training, so you provided some additional education to help increase your skills, which then takes us to the point where OK, you’ve got — you’ve obviously got your PharmD background, you’ve got some additional training, you’ve identified an opportunity to serve a group that perhaps isn’t being served to the full potential. So if I come to you, Marina, and I’m interested in this area of practice, whether I’m a pharmacist or not, like what are you offering? What is the product? What is the service?

Marina Buksov: There were a couple of iterations in my offerings. But it has evolved to me seeing clients in a functional medicine capacity as part of a team on a telehealth platform. So I realized that that would probably be the best use of my time in working with private clients whereas the majority of my business focus is really around educating and that knowledge gap to other providers and healthcare practitioners, especially pharmacists, that are wanting to learn about employing herbal medicine, whether they’re a pharmacy owner that wants to specialize and offer this to their patients or if there’s any other way that they would like to incorporate it as a private consultant like I did for many years or working with supplement companies as a consultant. I mean, there’s a myriad of ways. And that’s actually part of what we do in the program besides the didactic knowledge and homework that I give and accountability that I provide, I also train on the kind of business end side of things and how to actually implement some of these things into your work or business so that you have a successful vocation at the end of it.

Tim Ulbrich: Gotcha. So there’s both the patient side of it; you mentioned seeing clients one-on-one, and then more of the focus of what you’re doing on the business is training and educating others both on their clinical understanding but also some of the business aspects involved with this. So if we continue on the journey, I mentioned before often we have an experience that can spark an idea or lead to an interest that then takes us on our own entrepreneur journey to start something. Once you start something, obviously there’s then the task of OK, do folks know about what I’m doing? And how am I marketing this? And how am I making people aware of this? So tell us about your current strategies. I looked at your website; you’ve got a lot of great educational information, you’ve got a podcast. Like what is your strategy in terms of standing out so that other folks can become aware of who you are, your brand, the services that you offer, and ultimately engage in those and benefit from them.

Marina Buksov: This is definitely something that after I got the clinical knowledge side of things down — and again, I’m a person like many of us, especially pharmacists, we feel like we never know enough, so we always want more and more and more courses and all of this stuff, which I’m definitely guilty of. But eventually, I said, OK, I know enough to start helping people. So now I have to, again, focus on how am I presenting myself? How are people finding me? How can I serve? You know, because I am now capable of serving in the way that I want to serve. But how can I do that without any clients? So I had to also teach myself that and I have to say that it was a very hard and rocky journey to teach myself, so I really recommend investing in a coach that will show you the ropes, which is what I eventually had to do. I actually worked with several business coaches and was part of like Business Masterminds and again, those are great for accountability and support. And I’m trying to really cut that learning curve for people where they can just go to one program that will teach them a really, really good foundation and basis for everything that they would need in terms of botanical medicine, which is again, the backbone of every alternative, holistic practice in some way or form. And so people can get the clinical side of things, get a really good foundation and backbone, and start to dip their feet into the marketing and the business side of things immediately and finding themselves a niche and whatever else will help them on their particular implementation plan because for me, it took me a really long time. You know, I’ve been working slowly, slowly to build my business for about seven years now. And this year was the first year that I really pivoted and decided who am I going to serve and was really clear on that and came out with my program, which I mentioned, that I’m now running. So this all kind of solidified earlier this year.

Tim Ulbrich: And I hope our listeners, especially those that have an idea or maybe they’re at the beginning of their journey or maybe even feeling frustrated with, man, this is just not taking off as quickly as I can, just hearing that timeframe, right? Seven years. You know, I think back to the journey of YFP, coming up on seven years. And there is always something new that is to be learned. And I would encourage folks to check out your website, Marina. We’ll link to that in the show notes, DrMarinaBuksov.com, because I think you’ve done a really nice job of what I think is an important recipe to taking people along the journey from interest to actually being able to engage with those folks and then offer them a product or a service that is of value and hopefully is mutually beneficial between you and that individual. And you know, when you look on your website, you’ve got obviously valuable educational content in terms of interview that you do on the podcast and other resources, but you also have done a nice job with building lead generation techniques and guides and some other things that help you to capture those leads and then you have the ability to follow up with them and convert traffic into conversations that you can have and engage with that community. And so lead with value and then find a way to be able to capture that audience and then you can have that two-way conversation to see whether or not your services may be a good fit. Marina, I want to go back to something you mentioned a little bit earlier. And you mentioned it quickly, but it’s a really important point. And that is that folks that are going on this entrepreneurial journey, no matter where they are in that journey, I do think that certainly includes not only the professional side but a fair amount of personal development. And I believe from my experiences that often, engaging and leaning into the business can really bring out some of the best strengths that someone may have that maybe they weren’t even fully aware of what those strengths were, but it also can expose some weaknesses, opportunities for development, whatever you want to call it, that maybe otherwise weren’t exposed because of all the different hats that you have to wear as you’re trying to get a business off and running. So Marina, for your journey, what are an area or two that you think of by going through this journey and the work that you’ve done in starting this business, it’s really brought out or firmed some of the strengths that you have and then other side of the equation, maybe has exposed some opportunities where you even need to surround yourself with others’ support or even develop yourself a little bit further.

Marina Buksov: That’s a great question. I think really, this journey does expose you with the opportunities for growth, like you said, by exposing you to some of your not-so-favorite qualities or maybe even your worst qualities will come to life when you start to run a business because like I said, often we see the business as a reflection of us because it’s so personal to us. It’s related to our vocation and our personal mission, what we’re trying to be in the world. So sometimes, when we’re faced with not seeing success right away or as soon as we like or the level of success that we like, however you would like to measure that but most people measure it with fame or money or visibility or some kind of feedback, right, from the real world, maybe really good testimonials is another one. So whatever success is for you, it’s important to define it and to also be able to separate you from your business but also learn when it is a mirror and what you can learn from it. So you know, just because your business may not take off as soon as you’d like, like we said, seven years for us, or something is just not going your way or you’re experiencing some sort of setback, just know that it could be a “temporary failure” or think of it only as a lesson because you really can only either win or learn. That’s how I approach things nowadays. And so if something doesn’t take off immediately or doesn’t give you a reward on your investment right away, it doesn’t mean that it wasn’t valuable. It’s a step that was vital for you to not repeat that in the future or to learn a different strategy that will work better or some other important lesson for you to, again, learn from. And especially if you don’t have a business background, you should expect some sort of challenges or setbacks in business your first rodeo because you know, you could be a great pharmacist and know everything there is about pharmacy, but that doesn’t mean that you’ll know immediately how to run a business and how to have that proper mindset to run a business. So for me, it was a lot of coaching that helped me and also seeing that other people on the same journey as entrepreneurs are also experiencing similar challenges and setbacks. So viewing that as a normal part of the growth process instead of seeing it as a failure is my best advice. And ultimately, I realized that even if I do experience setbacks in my business, it’s still worth it for me to eventually have the opportunity to succeed by showing my mission and getting more recognition about my mission. And inspiring others to pursue their missions with my story is worth it to me, despite all of the setbacks that it has potentially.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. And that’s what I encourage folks: Share your story. You don’t know who’s listening, who may be affirmed by that, who might have an idea that it helps stimulate that forward, a student who’s feeling frustrated and unsure of where to go with their career path and just hearing about alternative ideas. I think so much value in that. And Marina, loved what you shared to connect that with the value for you of a coach. And I think that sometimes on this journey, like not only — especially for folks that are working full-time and they’re starting a business or an idea, you know, there’s that excitement, there’s that energy, but it also can be a lonely place and you’re putting in a lot of time. And having a coach, having a community, having a mastermind, having folks around you that you can bounce ideas off of and get support from, is just really important for the accountability but also be able to talk out loud as I think so much of this, we can live in our own thoughts as we’re trying to build the business. And shoutout here as I think about for YFP, my partner at YFP, Tim Baker, you know, I have the opportunity to sit down on a regular basis and we can share wins, we can share frustrations, but just having those conversations I think is so, so valuable. Marina, I’m going to ask you about the connection between the personal financial plan and what you’re doing on the business side and vice versa. And where I’m going with this is that I am a firm believer that a good, healthy business is often built and built confidently when you can build that upon having a strong personal financial foundation because you’re not necessarily worried about, ‘What about this? What about that?’ It doesn’t necessarily mean you have all of your financial goals achieved, but you’ve got a good foundation of which you can work from so you’re not constantly worried about that as you approach the business with confidence. And vice versa, often our business activities are able to help support our personal financial goals, whatever that may be for individuals that are listening. So tell us a little bit about for you, how the business and your personal plan have really worked alongside and have ultimately fed into one another.

Marina Buksov: I have to admit that I was a little bit floundering in this area before with actually tracking things. Like you were saying, it’s really important to bounce ideas and to talk about what’s happening, what are the wins, what are the challenges, and to actually put that into numbers and see in that way how your business is actually doing because numbers don’t lie, as they say. So that part of it, actually tracking and putting things down as data and analyzing it, you know, you can just remove some of the stigma that’s attached to OK, is this number a win or a fail? And actually, just view it as a statistic that is showing you OK, what can you improve on based on these numbers? You know, which area needs improvement? Which area is doing well? So that way, you can focus your resources and your time and energy on improving the things that aren’t doing well and doubling down on the things that are. But unless you track it and use numbers, you really won’t know. And so same thing with my business. You know, for a long time, I was reluctant to even put down numbers that are coming in from clients and balancing the checkbook and all of those kind of business tasks because it’s like a hassle because it’s another thing for you to do, but I realized that it’s very important and it actually gives you the clarity and the confidence with what needs to be done next because another thing that was a challenge for me is to learn how to prioritize. And so when you see the numbers in front of you, you see what needs to be done first. You know, what is an area that really needs your help and attention right now? And what scenario that can wait? And often, you know, I spread myself thin. I’m sure many other people do, trying to do all the things. But really, we need a structured guide so that you mentioned before, not to burn yourself out by all the business activities and to really have this focused plan of intention and a plan of action, which can really be informed by the numbers. So when earlier this year, you know, I was investing in coaching programs all these past years and really wanted to take my business to the next level and wanting to leave my job full-time, that’s when we started to — actually last year at this time, so about a year ago, my husband and I decided to look into a financial planner because we wanted to know, you know, where do we stand financially personally? And where can we be confident in making a certain buffer for ourselves so that we can take certain risks with our business? I think that’s really important to have a plan and to expect some setbacks. Nothing is going to be smooth sailing. You know, the past few years taught me that. But I decided it was really important to look at the numbers and to create a buffer, which we were comfortable for a certain period of time so that we give ourselves that safety zone from which the business could grow. And again, that’s always a risk. Is the business is going to take off exactly per our plan, our projections, or not? So shameless plug to YFP: I was working with YFP, and I found that I really didn’t know much because this is not my area of interest, right? Accounting and counting numbers, I am more into health and wellness and getting results for my clients. I would like to dedicate my time for those kind of things. But living in the real world, you do have to think about personal finances and business finances and retirement and putting away money for more expenses than you even are expecting because —

Tim Ulbrich: Boring, right?

Marina Buksov: Yeah, a lot of us live paycheck-to-paycheck, and we don’t realize, you know, we need to set aside money for this or we need to plan an estate or we need to maybe save for education for our kids or if you are a homeowner, there’s many hidden expenses that pop up that you don’t expect. So we decided it was time for us to kind of get a realistic perspective and reality check so that we can be more confident in the business side of things. And so I highly recommend working with a financial advisor that has your best interests at heart and doesn’t just want to sell you things with commission attached.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think for Marina, you mentioned some of the value that can come from the technical side, right, of the financial plan. I know for Jess and I and our journey, which I think is something that others may find value in, is sometimes when you’re in the weeds of your own financial plan, it’s really hard to see outward, right? And having somebody as a third party, you know, thinking of spouses or couples that might be working with a planner specifically, where you can have somebody ask really good questions that get you thinking, that get you talking, that get you really evaluating like, what is the true risk on this scale, right? And I think that while I don’t want to categorize all pharmacists as being risk-averse, I think sometimes we view financial decisions on that end — and I’m certainly not promoting that we go out and make crazy financial decisions, right. We’ve got to take care of our future self. But we’ve also got to live a rich life today. And part of what I’m hearing through this interview, Marina, for you is living a rich life was pursuing this passion that not only was only important to your physical and emotional health but also what you saw as an opportunity to bring this information to other healthcare practitioners and ultimately the patients that they serve to be able to have an impact. And that’s an investment worth making, right, in being able to see that through, whether it’s a coach, whether it’s a financial planner, and certainly all the other investments you’ve made in getting the business up. Marina, I’m thinking back to your journey where you mentioned, ‘Hey, I’m graduating pharmacy school. Yeah, it’s been an interesting ride, but I don’t really feel like I fit, right? I don’t fit in a traditional mode of fellowship or of residencies or, you know, community pharmacy or inpatient practice. And so I suspect we have a lot of other people that might be feeling that, whether it’s students that are maybe questioning was this the right decision or I’m not sure where I’m going to go or practicing pharmacists that might feel the pull to explore another area of pharmacy and how their pharmacy degree could be used but they just don’t know where to go, who to talk to, where to start. What advice would you have for folks that are out there that are listening and feeling like, I’m just not sure I really fit in this whole pharmacy thing. Like where do I go? What do I do?

Marina Buksov: Yeah, so I think the best thing to do is really dip your toes, just like I was talking about how I selected a diverse variety of rotation sites for myself in APs and FPs. As much as possible, I tried to diversify. I worked in insurances, worked in different settings, pharmaceutical industry, basically everything was super different. And that taught me, actually, what I liked and what I didn’t like because just getting a glimpse into a setting and how it would be like to work there and the day-to-day, how to assess what they’re doing on their back end and how you feel about that and then giving you a sense of if you can climb the ladder in that space, if it’s more corporate or not. So you can kind of picture yourself in those spaces and see do you feel good there? And does this agree with your inner wiring or your ethics? Because for me, I found that I really wanted to make an impact. That was important to me to use my skills in a way that was impactful and that I felt I was creating good in the world. And I saw that as targeting the low-hanging fruit, you know, how we can improve on a large scale our public health and self-care by education and by self-care. That’s really my mission, what it really boils down to. And the other settings for me didn’t provide that level of impact. You know, there was some personal gratification or again that prestige aspect in some settings, but I was not on the same mission as those settings and what they were doing. So I didn’t feel like I fit in there. On the other hand of the spectrum, even if you don’t get to go on a variety of rotation sites, you can find your own opportunities. So actually, I had a bunch of students reach out to me. And I might be a preceptor someday soon.

Tim Ulbrich: Oh, fun.

Marina Buksov: And then besides — nowadays, yeah, the opportunities are crazy because we’re in a virtual world. But you can also just reach out locally. So when I was considering going to herb school — actually, before I even knew there was a thing because that’s another missing knowledge gap because I didn’t even know there was such a thing — so before I even knew somebody had recommended that I check out an herb shop as a place where I could practice alternative pharmacy. So I went to a local herb shop and asked the owner to give me an internship, which he did. So there is plenty of ways you can create your own opportunity and learn from the experience and empirically applying yourself there. It’s going to teach you so much more than what you can read in a blog or a book. So that’s really what I recommend. And when I was in the shop, that’s when I decided to go to this school and get a more formal education because I did see myself aligning with that and being interested to learn more. So I think exposing yourself to experiencing is the best teacher. So whatever way you can do that locally or virtually nowadays and get somebody to mentor you or again, if you’re able to invest in a coach if let’s say you’re not a student but you’re a pharmacist, it is worth it to have some level of guidance or mentorship.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, great advice and wisdom, Marina. And back to a comment that you made earlier. You either win or you learned along the way, correct? And I think of maybe students who have some of those opportunities to choose rotations and get out there and network. But for pharmacists that are out there, you know, don’t let that be a hindrance. You know, reach out to folks like Marina. Reach out to folks in other nontraditional areas. You know, have several conversations. People are very willing typically to meet. And I think not only will that networking be really valuable, but I think it will also stimulate hopefully some ideas and conversations and lead to other connections that will affirm areas of interest and hopefully generate some ideas as well. Marina, I really appreciate you taking the time to share your story. I’m looking forward to following your journey in the years ahead. And I have a feeling you have inspired folks that are listening and perhaps in their own journey, whether they may be on moving forward with some of the ideas that they have of their own. So Marina, as we wrap up, where can listeners go to learn more about you and the work that you’re doing and to connect with you?

Marina Buksov: Yes, so the website you mentioned, it’s DrMarinaBuksov.com. And it has all the links to my social media. But I am on Facebook and Instagram and even TikTok nowadays. So you could reach me everywhere at @DrMarinaBuksov. And you can also search by my business name, which is Raw Fork.

Tim Ulbrich: Great. We’ll link to those in the show notes. And again, Marina, thank you so much for your time.

Marina Buksov: Thank you so much, Tim.

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YFP 217: How Kelley Used Her Clinical Expertise to Build a Business

Posted on by yfpadmin


How Kelley Used Her Clinical Expertise to Build a Business

On this episode, sponsored by GoodRx, Kelley Carlstrom shares how she has leveraged her clinical expertise to make oncology specialty training more accessible.

About Today’s Guest

Kelley D. Carlstrom received her Doctor of Pharmacy from The University of Colorado and completed post-graduate residency training at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, MA. She is a board-certified oncology pharmacist that has worked in a variety of traditional and non-traditional settings including at a large academic medical center where she specialized in blood and marrow transplantation, at a small community hospital, as a consultant for a large electronic medical record implementation, and most recently at a healthcare technology startup company committed to building software products for oncology clinicians. Kelley is passionate about oncology and sees a growing need for more pharmacists to be trained in this specialty. She has launched KelleyCPharmD, LLC which offers unique oncology training opportunities because she believes every pharmacist deserves access to specialty training that can transform their career.

Summary

Kelley Carlstrom, a board-certified oncology pharmacist, joins Tim Ulbrich on this episode to discuss her side hustle, which arguably is more of a full-time business. She talks about her career journey as a clinical oncology specialist, what motivated her to develop oncology training opportunities through KelleyCPharmD, and how her business has accelerated her financial plan.

Through her career experiences, Kelley learned there are gaps in oncology specialty training availability and a lack of support for pharmacists managing complex cancer treatments without additional resources. This shortage of resources and training, partnered with a need for oncology-trained pharmacists across the country, created an opportunity to build technology and education to fill that gap. Kelley saw this problem and began working on a solution, and KelleyCPharmD was born.

Without a background in business or being a prior business owner, Kelley had to learn how to take on various tasks outside of her comfort zone, including building her website. Initially, she explains, she wanted to make low-risk financial decisions about the business while testing its necessity and benefit to the pharmacy community. For Kelley, this hustle is not just a temporary solution. She is in it for the long haul. Kelley has built a business that she enjoys, sharing that experience with other pharmacists who she employs. She sees KelleyCPharmD and the flexibility that it will bring to her life as an integral part of her long-term financial plan.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Kelley, thank you for coming on the show.

Kelley Carlstrom: Thanks so much for having me.

Tim Ulbrich: Really excited to dig into your pharmacy journey as well as your business, Kelley C, PharmD, LLC and your upcoming launch of a really incredible course. And I was sharing with you before we hit record, our paths crossed several years ago when you were up at Northeast Ohio and I was up at Northeast Ohio. And as we will share throughout this episode, your career has really taken some interesting turns and I love the mission and the work that you’re doing as a trained oncology pharmacist to really help impact and provide those services to other pharmacists and ultimately to have a positive impact on patient care. So excited for this interview and getting it out to our community. I think they’re going to find it really inspirational. So we have, as those that are listening know, we have featured several pharmacy entrepreneurs on this show as they have shared their business stories, their side hustle stories, and to be clear, the work that we’re going to talk about today that Kelley is doing at Kelley C, PharmD, is more than what I think of when I hear “side hustle.” This really feels more like a main hustle. But our goal nonetheless is the same, and that is to share inspiring stories of pharmacists such as Kelley that have really taken their clinical experience and training and because of their passion, developed an incredible business and offering that is helping other pharmacists while helping also accelerate their personal financial goals. So Kelley, start us off by telling us about how you got into pharmacy, where you went to school, and your training and some of the first work that you did after school and in residency.

Kelley Carlstrom: Sure. So I went to pharmacy school, I worked as a technician, actually, for a long time before pharmacy school. So I’ve been in pharmacy for awhile. But I graduated pharmacy school in 2010 from the University of Colorado. And I moved to Boston for postgraduate residency training. So I did my first year at Beth Israel Deaconess and my second year literally a stone’s throw across the street at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. After I did residency, I moved to Cleveland, of which I had never been before. I’d spent about 24 hours in an interview there and moved for a really incredible job. And my — I was tasked with starting a new pharmacy-led ambulatory service in the bone marrow transplant department. They had really a not — they had very few pharmacists that touched patients in the ambulatory setting. But they were having some issues in bone marrow transplant when the patients were admitted. They were on interacting drugs, their med rec was terrible. So they really wanted to try to capture those patients up front. And I loved it. I loved the ambulatory setting, I got to chat with patients all day long. And I did that for several years and ended up deciding to broaden my scope a little bit because bone marrow transplant, although I love it, is super niche. Rare treatment of rare cancers. So I ended up moving to a small community hospital within the same health system. So I went from working with 10 physicians in my niche in bone marrow transplant down to two physicians that covered all cancers. So really different environment, large academic center down to community center. And I learned a lot there. I learned that this is where the majority of cancer patients are treated in this country are these small community centers. Most of them don’t go to these large academic places. And I learned what it was like to be the only pharmacist in this type of setting. So I did everything. I did the clinical work, I did the order verification, the product verification, and I am so thankful still to this day I had a rockstar technician that kept me on task. So it was a great learning experience.

Tim Ulbrich: So Kelley, you talked about, you know, your time at school in Colorado, made the move cross-country to Boston, from Boston to northeast Ohio where you’re at a large academic medical center, regarded as one of the best healthcare institutions really in the world. And then you decide to make a pivot to a smaller community hospital within that same system. You know, I think the question that comes to mind is why make that pivot from the large academic medical center where we tend to think about the specialty experiences, the high intensity care types of cases, you know, that’s where we’re really going to get the most bang for our buck as a specialist and what we’ve been trained to do. Why make that move? And tell me more about when you say that you realized many patients are getting their care in the — more of the local, community setting, not necessarily going to those larger academic health centers, what did that really help you do in terms of form your thoughts around what support pharmacists do or do not get in those roles where they’re not at those large institutions?

Kelley Carlstrom: Well, I did realize that just a couple years out of residency, I had hit the top rung of my career ladder. And I was a little surprised about that. And I guess I shouldn’t have been when I kind of understood what the career trajectory was after residency. But I was, you know, doing all of the things that we do in clinical specialist roles. I was seeing patients, I was involved in the residency program, I was a director of the PGY2 program, I spoke at conferences, you know, I gave CEs, I did all the things, but I was at that top rung and wanted to expand and see what else was out there, how else I could develop my skills. So that’s what moved me to the community practice. And when I got there, I think what it showed to me, I was very — I felt very fortunate because I had — like I mentioned, I was the only pharmacist in the whole hospital, let alone the cancer center that had any oncology experience. So I felt fortunate that I could rely on my residency training, I could rely on my colleagues that I had connected with, that I had worked with over many years, and I could reach out for help. But as I interacted with other pharmacists at other smaller community centers like me, I realized not everybody has those resources. And I thought it would be pretty terrifying. I mean, I was busy throughout the day, there was a lot of questions I didn’t know, I don’t know why every 5FU pump shows up at 10 a.m. on a Tuesday, you know? It’s really busy, it’s a fast-paced type of environment. And I just, I was so fortunate that I had resources to tap. And I was just wondering, how do these other pharmacists manage this? Because like I said, there’s so many of these cancer centers. And yeah, I just wanted to determine how other pharmacists kind of make that successful.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think we’re going to come back in a little bit and dig into more of what I perceive to be the solution that you’ve developed to the problem that you observed in terms of pharmacists that are at these smaller institutions or even perhaps institutions that may not have access to those pharmacists and how can we be able to provide those services in a way that might seem a little bit more nontraditional. Kelley, it reminds me — you know, one of the thoughts I had often in my academic roles where it’s very common where there’s a shared faculty member that spending time at the college and time at the practice site and often, the funding of those positions may be split between those institutions, and those practice sites tend to be very robust, they tend to be very innovative, they’re training students. But I always left feeling a little bit unsettled of like, how does this scale? Or how does this translate when we think about the pharmacist impact nationally and ultimately, what a pharmacist can do to improve patient care? And I think those types of pilot sites, I guess you could call them, are great. Or if I think about here, what we’re discussing in terms of sites that have access to really robust, advanced residency training programs and clinical specialists, that’s great. But that’s a really small percentage overall of the institutions that are out there across the country. And so I think the vision that you have here — and we’ll talk more about some of the services that you’re deploying to help solve this problem, is really an interesting one. And when I first learned more about that, it was kind of a lightbulb moment for me of wow, like this is a really incredible opportunity for here, we’re talking about oncology practice, but I could see how this could also translate beyond oncology practice of how do we be able to really extend the expertise of a pharmacist outside of what we might think are the institutions that are able to offer these services or have the resources to do so. Now, before we get into that and talking more about what you’ve developed with Kelley C, PharmD, and to really help solve this problem, bring us up to speed with your current positions and the transition you made after that experience at the small community hospital and the work that you’ve been doing since then.

Kelley Carlstrom: I was pretty happy in my small community role, and I had a recruiter reach out to me through LinkedIn, which is one reason I’m so passionate about advocating for pharmacists to be on LinkedIn because this is where a lot of job opportunities come from. So I got recruited into a consulting role where I helped a large center get off of their paper chemotherapy orders and into their EMR, which there still are cancer centers and other centers that are on paper orders. And what surprised me is that I found this love for oncology and technology that I didn’t realize I had. You know, it’s not the typical path of a clinical specialist to end up on the tech side or the informatics side of things. But what I realized is that we have a lot of bad tech in healthcare. And the reason why we do is because there’s not enough clinicians helping inform those products. So I did that for awhile, almost three years. And when that contract ended, I was looking to stay in the technology space. So I ended up at a healthcare technology startup. So an interesting role for a pharmacist, and it’s really great because we’re making software products for oncology physicians and patients. And I get to bring my clinical practice experience to help inform those products.

Tim Ulbrich: And that led you out to San Francisco, correct?

Kelley Carlstrom: It did.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah. So adding to the list, as we talked about, you know, Colorado to Boston to Cleveland and so forth. So really cool. So on top of that role and that position that you’re working in in that startup where you’re able to really blend your passion and love for oncology with some more of the informatics technology side, I want to shift gears and talk about the business that you have developed because I think it’s a really interesting example and one that I’m excited to share with our community about how you’ve been able to leverage your clinical expertise and ultimately monetize that expertise while being able to provide value and a service to other pharmacists and ultimately, the patients they serve. So Kelley C, PharmD, LLC, tell us about when it started, how it started, and ultimately what was some of the why behind getting this effort off the ground?

Kelley Carlstrom: Well technically, it started two years ago. That’s when I made my LLC. But I had some ideas floating around in my head before that from what we spoke about when I was at the community cancer center and really just trying to understand who were the pharmacists that work in these settings and what kind of support do they need? And in addition to my experience there, I had a lot of pharmacists reaching out to me on LinkedIn, getting messages every day about ‘Hey, I’m new to oncology,’ or, ‘Hey, I’m covering for a maternity leave and I’ve been thrown in here and I don’t know what I’m doing.’ You know, ‘Where can I learn the basics of oncology?’ And so I sought out — I started to research like, OK, what hyperlinks can I give these people, what are articles can they read, and there was nothing cohesive out there. You know, I had to send people to a slew of different websites. And it’s just — there’s nothing that was at the baseline level of what these pharmacists needed. So that’s when I got an initial idea, but what really sparked it was I went to the MediPreneur conference, which is a conference for pharmacist entrepreneurs or other medical professional entrepreneurs. And it was great to be in a room with a lot of like-minded people that had big ideas and really just started chatting through what could this actually look like? What does being a business owner look like? Because of course, in pharmacy, we don’t get a lot of exposure to that. I think my school had a business elective that I didn’t take because I didn’t think I needed it. So you know, I don’t know anything about business. So that’s really when the process started. And from there, I just took a lot of really small steps of reaching out to pharmacists and saying, “Hey, what kind of information do you need?” and kind of gleaning more information. And it’s been growing since then.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and as I mentioned on the call before we hit record, this really feels disruptive to me in a good way. And I think one of the things you shared is that there’s this idea in the profession that you can only work in oncology if you’re residency-trained, perhaps two years of training, board certification, and so forth. And that’s just not true in terms of the number of people that are out there that are working in oncology practice without training that might not be getting support. And that could be situations like you mentioned of, hey, somebody’s on leave and I’ve been thrown into this role and I want to make sure I’m doing my job well as a pharmacist and so how do I get up to speed? Or it could be maybe somebody who has been in a staff pharmacist role or maybe a general pharmacist role and they have this interest in oncology that’s flourishing. And maybe they’re out five, seven, 10 years and the idea of going back and doing some additional residency doesn’t necessarily make a whole lot of sense. And so how do we make this more accessible and to get the support that they need? And one of the things I love, Kelley, from your website is that you say, “My goal is to bring hope and optimism back to the pharmacy profession because everyone deserves access to specialty training that can transform their career.” And that mission, I know our listeners know that I talk often about any good business is ultimately finding a solution to a problem that is out there and is one that people care about. And I think you really have, you know, nailed this with a strong why and motivation behind what you’re trying to do. So kudos on the vision and for taking some of that risk to get this off the ground, even if that means not necessarily following what would be a traditional path as we think about pharmacists in these roles.

Kelley Carlstrom: Yeah, let me throw a couple numbers at you, Tim, that kind of explain this. So yeah, I completely agree with what you said about not everybody can do residency training. And we can’t restrict people working in oncology just to those that are residency-trained. And the reason for that is we don’t have enough pharmacists. So there are 71 NCI-designated cancer centers, so National Cancer Institute. And these are, they’re only in 36 states, so there’s not even one NCI center in every state. And these are the big, urban centers where residents are trained and where clinical specialists typically work. So 71. But there are more than 1,500 cancer centers in the country accredited by the Commission on Cancer. And that — they all dispense chemotherapy. There’s probably other centers, infusion centers, that dispense chemotherapy, that aren’t accredited. So we need more pharmacists to work in all of these various settings. And there are constantly oncology jobs posted. I talk with recruiters that can’t fill oncology jobs. So I know you’ve talked previously on episodes about where the profession is going and the shrinking job market, but oncology is not experiencing that. We have a lot of opportunity.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I’m glad you said that, Kelley, because I think this is a great example where we often talk about the job market and trends from a global standpoint. And we really need to get down in the weeds a little bit in that there are certainly sectors of the profession, you’re talking about one here, where there’s arguably considerable opportunity for growth. And I think that’s one of the challenges when we look at general trends, Bureau of Labor Statistics, indices, etc., we’re looking at the whole pie. And really, it can be different stories if we look at different parts of the profession. And as I put on my employer hat for a moment, Kelley, like if I’m a director of pharmacy or a Chief Pharmacy Officer, and I have this open position in oncology that I can’t fill, you know, I could sit around and perhaps wait for the right time and the right person that has clinical specialist training, residency training, board certification, etc., or I might have someone in my department who has been a high performer, is a known entity, has an interest in oncology, and if there was more readily available access to resources and training, I could develop that person internally and be able to promote them up into that role. And that’s where when I say I think you’re onto something disruptive, I think that’s a great example where, you know, there’s an opportunity through more readily available training and resources to be able to train up folks within a workforce or to be able to make these positions more readily available.

Kelley Carlstrom: Exactly.

Tim Ulbrich: So talk to us more about the products and services. We’ve talked about the problem, right, that we’ve identified. You’ve talked a little bit about the why there’s a need for this. So what does the solution look like? When we talk about readily accessible resources and training, talk to us a little bit more about the products and services that you currently offer, the focus of what you do on your website, and more specifically, about the Enjoy Learning Oncology program, the ELO program for short, which is a new course that you’re going to be launching soon.

Kelley Carlstrom: So I see three main paths to learning oncology. There’s the do-it-yourself, the DIY path, where you can learn oncology on your own. All the information you need is free on the internet. But that’s the problem, right? The internet is a vast place, and you can fall down into a lot of rabbit holes, and it’s not really — it takes a lot of time investment up front to kind of do your own curation of the information. The second piece is the curated content, so what’s already been packaged out there? You know, some of the CE programs I’d put in this bucket. You’re kind of given some information. You still have to do it on your own, but it’s kind of already been collated for you. And then the third piece is the facilitated training path, which is what I’m going down. And I like to think of this as an Orange Theory analogy.

Tim Ulbrich: Yes. Yes, give us an Orange Theory analogy. Yes.

Kelley Carlstrom: So I love Orange Theory. I went a lot pre-pandemic. And what I love about it is you just show up. You don’t have to bring water, you don’t have to bring a towel, you just get dressed and you walk in the door. And they tell you what to do. “Go get on this treadmill, run at this pace, do this on the rower.” And you still have to show up and do the work, you have to burn the calories, put in the effort. But you don’t have to spend time and effort thinking, you know, what’s my workout program going to be today or tracking in your app how many reps I did. And I’ve modeled my program off of that because you also have access to those experts in the class. You can say, “Hey, is my form good?” or ask a question about the rowing machine or how fast should I be going, what’s my speed? So my program, my ELO program, has three main components. And the component that I’m most passionate about is what I call the ELO collaborative. So what this includes is a basics training program, so foundation of things like how to verify a chemotherapy order. It includes my blueprint online course, which is a really robust program that has 20+ weekly modules. And it goes through all the major diseases and a couple non-clinical topics. But what the collaborative does is it houses all of those in a bubble of access to experts. This is the biggest challenge I see and what I’ve heard from pharmacists is I can read all this material, but I have questions, I don’t understand how these things link together, I don’t know if this actually happens in real life. Just because it’s in the guidelines doesn’t mean it happens in practice. And so we need resources to be able to help direct people when they have questions. So how I do that is I hire other expert oncology pharmacists to support clients in my program. And that is through — you can ask questions weekly as you go through the content in my Slack channel. And then we have live office hours virtually where you can pick the brain of an oncology pharmacist.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s awesome. That’s really cool. And that feels like, Kelley, to me as you talked through the three types of training pathways, the DIY, more of a traditional CE type approach, and then obviously what you’re doing here, those things where you’ve got more of the support, the community aspect, the live office hours, and so forth, access to various experts, more up-to-date, relevant information, that really feels like the differentiator from that more of a traditional model. Is that accurate?

Kelley Carlstrom: Yes.

Tim Ulbrich: OK.

Kelley Carlstrom: I think that’s the big piece that people have told me. They have questions and they have nowhere to go to ask them.

Tim Ulbrich: You know, I love your Orange Theory analysis here. And I want to take it a step further because I participated in Orange Theory for awhile pre-pandemic, and for all the reasons that you mentioned, I thought it was incredibly impactful. A couple other things that I think resonate here as well as we’re talking about the ELO program and what you’ve developed and would be of interest to other pharmacists that might think about developing something on their own, if you want the Orange Theory type of model, you book an appointment, you’re accountable, and if you don’t show up, even though you’re paying a monthly fee, if you don’t show up, you’re going to get charged, right? And you know, one of the things I love about folks that are monetizing their clinical expertise is that for the user, for the person that’s purchasing, there is value and power in someone having skin in the game. You know, maybe you offer something for free and you get more folks involved. I can tell you from our experiences at YFP and a lot of what we’ve done, I heard from other pharmacy entrepreneurs, is that there is value in folks that make an investment to pay for something that they then perceive there is a personal return on that investment and therefore, there’s a commitment of time and energy to be able to participate in that. So I would encourage folks that are thinking about monetizing clinical expertise and services, No. 1, don’t be scared to charge for your expertise and your time, and No. 2, make sure you’re not underestimating what your service is worth. Because I think we tend to maybe have that approach for some pharmacists that are out there. The other thing I would say to that is, you know, I remember going to some of those workouts and like, you’re right, I mean, you don’t have to have all the equipment, you show up, the workout is ready for you, but you better walk in the door with a mindset of being ready to personally grow or else your butt is going to get kicked, right, for that day. And I think that’s true here. Like when you’re going to invest a lot of time and some money in a course that you’re making a commitment to develop individually and professionally, like you’ve got to be ready. You’ve got to be ready to engage. And I think the accountability you have with other learners and the accountability you have with live office hours and things like that really helps to facilitate that as well. But I think the mindset going in to a program like this is really important to be able to get everything out of it that you want to.

Kelley Carlstrom: I completely agree. Accountability is really difficult with a long program. Oncology is hard. Like it’s — we have a steep learning curve. But our profession is a profession of self-learners. So if anyone can learn oncology, it’s any pharmacist. And you just need to show up and put in the time because at the end of the day, nobody can make you learn or develop new skills. It’s really on you.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s right.

Kelley Carlstrom: And you know, my program is about eight months long. So this is not a short, do it one time course and learn all about oncology. I need you to stay committed.

Tim Ulbrich: So at the time of this episode launching, your course is maybe live or about to be live here really soon, so where can folks go to learn more about not only Kelley C, PharmD, but also more specifically about this course, the ELO program.

Kelley Carlstrom: Yeah, you can visit my website at kelleycpharmd.com. And that’s Kelley with an -ey here.

Tim Ulbrich: Awesome, awesome. Let’s transition, Kelley. One of the questions I like to ask folks that are especially working full-time, they’ve started their own business whether we want to call it a side hustle — I would argue this is not. You know, it seems more than that, as I mentioned at the beginning — but whatever we want to call it, at the end of the day, you know, I think some of this is about really having a strong vision for what you want to do, the impact that you want to have, and obviously I can tell this is fulfilling work to you. But I think part of this is also about like you have financial goals, you have a financial plan, and you want to be able to accelerate some of those as well. So how has this business accelerated and impacted your financial plan?

Kelley Carlstrom: So this is — I’m in it for the long game here. So it has not had an impact on my financial plan in the short term. But what — my focus when I initially started this was, you know, not being a business owner not having any experience with business before. I wanted to kind of tiptoe my way in and do a lot of bootstrapping initially. So for example, I built my own website. Not a skill pharmacists typically have. And I definitely wasn’t great at it. But I didn’t want to make huge investments up front until I kind of got some feedback and determined if I was on the right path. So over the past two years, I’ve been getting that incremental information and investing more and more in my business. So what I — definitely what I am interested in is having this be an integral part of my plan, my financial plan, and what that gives me is flexibility. And at the end of the day, flexibility in my view is the end-all, be-all that gives you opportunity to go whatever path you want to go. If you want to take a different job, if you want to take a different job that maybe pays less, like you don’t have that pressure of needing a full-time income or benefits from a particular job. It gives you a lot more options.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. We’ve talked about the power of flexibility on this show so many times as I think that others share your belief on the value and the power that that has. Kelley, let me ask you, you mentioned — paraphrasing here — that you know, you weren’t a business owner, you didn’t see yourself necessarily as a business owner and entrepreneur. You’re a clinically-trained specialist. And so here you’ve got this really cool idea, you think that you have a solution to a problem. But I always say, there’s a big chasm between like idea and actually having something that’s out there, right? And I think this chasm is where a lot of people get overwhelmed, get lost, or perhaps give up? And Seth Godin, one of my favorite authors, talks about this as the concept of being the dip. You know, when we’ve got a really cool idea, whether it’s a project at work, whether it’s a business idea, whatever, we get really excited about it. And then we quickly find ourselves in this dip of like, oh crap, like what do I do next? And what is this really going to take? And like am I ready to kind of go through this? And what he argues in that book of which I agree with is oftentimes, we never get on the other side of the chasm or the other side of the dip because we get lost in that period. So for you, you know, you mentioned building your own website and that’s awesome. I noticed that when I was looking at the site the other day. Like as someone who doesn’t necessarily view themselves as an entrepreneur or a business person — although I would challenge you a little bit on that — what were some of the big barriers to bridging that gap between idea and actually having something to go?

Kelley Carlstrom: The biggest barrier I think is your understanding or my understanding of what you’re capable of because I think, like you said, you look into this chasm of I don’t know a lot of this information, and it can easily get in your way. So for example, initially, I was sending out an email newsletter with some interesting jobs I found that didn’t require residency. And I was manually sending these emails, Tim. I didn’t realize what an email provider was. And so I really started at the baseline of understanding all of these skills. But one thing that in my traditional or in my career path that really helped me, when I got into my consulting role, I moved from being a full-time employee to being a consultant contractor, which is a much riskier position, you can be let go at any time. And what I learned from that was I was much more project-based. So I had to show up and understand what value I was bringing and what I was delivering at the end of this project. And that’s a different mindset than when you’re an employee.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s right.

Kelley Carlstrom: So that really shifted me to think OK, I see a problem, these pharmacists reaching out to me and telling me they have a problem — shouting at me, actually. When I finally recognized OK, somebody’s giving me an opportunity here, there’s a problem, then I start thinking about how can I fix this? What’s the deliverable at the end of it? And I just started walking down that path of asking questions, the resources at the MediPreneur Summit kind of got me kicked off. They gave me a couple other references, and I just started learning on my own. I invested in some coaching and some other programs that really kind of taught me a lot of the nuances. But it’s a journey for sure. Like there is not a destination here. I am learning something every single day. There’s lots of great new technology out there to help us, depending on what you’re offering. So I’ve really enjoyed flexing those skills that I didn’t get to flex before.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think if folks that are listening that have an idea, you know, really let sink in what you said about it is a journey. I don’t view this as there’s an end point per se because there’s always the learning that’s happening of new tools, new resources, how can this be improved. But one thing you said that really resonates with me, and I’ve shared on the show before, you said, I just started, right? And there are several ways that you just started, whether it was eventually you built that website, you mentioned engaging in coaching, you attended the summit, MediPreneur Summit, which sounds like had a big impact on kind of accelerating the idea forward. And one of my favorite books I’ve referenced on the show before is “Start” by John Acoff. And that was really instrumental for me as well of OK, how do I get over some of these internal objections and fears and all these questions, and what’s one thing I can do to get started, even though you know, like you will look back, Kelley, I know you will, in five years — and even though I think you’ve done an awesome job building your site and what you have — you’ll look back and say, “Wow. This has come a long way.” Right? “It’s grown, and I can’t believe that I did this or that,” or “I can’t believe I didn’t use an email provider.” And that’s OK. Like not letting those things paralyze you but really just trying to move forward because at the end of the day, you’ve got a good vision, and you’ve got a problem that needs to be solved, and I think you’ve certainly got a solution to that. What about time? You know, I sense that many people listening are thinking, Kelley, like where and how are you finding time to build a website, you’re working a full-time position, I’m sure in a startup environment, that doesn’t mean you’re not working a decent amount of hours. So how are you balancing this with your pharmacy job? How many hours are you spending of the week in the business? Tell us a little bit more about that.

Kelley Carlstrom: Yeah, time balancing is definitely tricky. So this is my night — every night and every weekend is pretty much what I work on this. I think the — when I was first developing kind of what program I would want to create or what product I wanted to create, I had some great advice about not making a product you don’t — or not building a business that you don’t want to work in. And it sounds kind of intuitive, but when you’re initially thinking of what is the problem and what’s the solution, it can easily fall in the trap of making something that fits the solution but doesn’t fit your particular lifestyle or goals. And so when I was initially making my bigger, robust program with these 20+ modules, I was thinking, OK, I can make all this — I can do this all myself. I have this knowledge. But then I had the epiphany one day where I was thinking, why would I do this all on my own? Like I have a full-time job. I don’t need to do this on my own. So that’s when I got into the track of my business where I hire other pharmacists because what I’m realizing now is that there’s kind of a mass exodus in oncology pharmacy. A lot of experienced clinicians are leaving patient care and going into nontraditional roles, particularly pharma. And I think one reason — it’s multifaceted, but I think burnout is definitely one part of it — but one reason is that there’s not a lot of other opportunities within their role to monetize their knowledge or kind of move above that career ladder. And you can be on an advisory board or speaker panel for pharma and make a little extra money, but not — those have conflicts of interest so not everybody can do that. You can give a presentation at a conference that they usually pay you for, but then you have to slave over a slide deck. And at the end of the day, your hourly wage is pretty meager. So you know, not only am I helping pharmacists learn this material, but I wanted to bring in these expert pharmacists and pay them for their knowledge to help support me so I don’t have to do everything myself. Staff your liabilities is one of my most important phrases lately. Hire out help.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. And I think those hires, Kelley, like it sounds like for you — I know we’ve noticed the same thing — like in the moment, they feel really weighty, right? Not only from a financial standpoint but also you’re giving up some of that control of whatever piece or part but so instrumental to getting comfortable with that and really, at the end of the day, again, you’ve got a great vision and a big vision, and at the end of the day, like Kelley can only do so much to accomplish this vision, right? And so how does the business not necessarily become just Kelley but it’s about this accessibility of oncology specialist training to as many pharmacists that need it and that can get it out there and that you might be the limiting step to that to be able to accomplish that. And so how do you be able to build the business in a way that supports other people helping? I said this before we hit record, I mean it genuinely, so I’m going to say it again: I was really excited about this interview. You’ve delivered on inspiring me, and I sense that’s going to be true for many of our listeners as well that may have some ideas that are floating out there and maybe have not taken action on some of those and are ready to move those forward. Where can folks go or what is the best place for folks to go to connect with you and to learn more about the work that you’re doing?

Kelley Carlstrom: So you can learn more on my website, KelleyCPharmD.com. But I would love if you would connect with me on LinkedIn. LinkedIn is my favorite place to hang out, and I think most pharmacists do not maximize LinkedIn to the fullest potential. And there’s a lot of opportunity on there. So definitely reach out and send me a message.

Tim Ulbrich: Great stuff, Kelley. And again, that’s KelleyCPharmD.com. That’s Kelley with -ey, and you can connect with her on LinkedIn. We will put her information into the show notes. If you have a story and you’re listening, you have a story that you think would make for a good episode on the podcast that either you’re monetizing your clinical expertise or have knowledge of someone else that is, please reach out to us and as always, do us a favor and leave us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts so more pharmacists can find this show as well. Thank you so much for joining, and hope to have you back here again next week. Take care.

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YFP 216: Common Credit Blunders to Avoid When Buying a Home

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Common Credit Blunders to Avoid When Buying a Home

On this episode, sponsored by IBERIABANK/First Horizon, Tony Umholtz discusses common credit blunders when buying a home.

About Today’s Guest

Tony graduated Cum Laude from the University of South Florida with a B.S. in Finance from the Muma College of Business. He then went on to complete his MBA. While at USF, Tony was part of the inaugural football team in 1997. He earned both Academic and AP All-American Honors during his collegiate career. After college, Tony had the opportunity to sign contracts with several NFL teams including the Tennessee Titans, New York Giants, and the New England Patriots. Being active in the community is also important to Tony. He has served or serves as a board member for several charitable and non-profit organizations including board member for the Salvation Army, FCA Tampa Bay, and the USF National Alumni Association. Having orchestrated over $1.1 billion in lending volume during his career, Tony has consistently been ranked as one of the top mortgage loan officers in the industry by the Scotsman’s Guide, Mortgage Executive magazine, and Mortgage Originator magazine.

Summary

Tony Umholtz, a mortgage manager for IBERIABANK/First Horizon, discusses the impact of credit on purchasing a home and common credit blunders that he has encountered when working with pharmacists during the lending process for the pharmacists home loan product.

Tony explains how credit and your credit score can impact your home buying process. Your credit score can affect your interest rate for a home loan. He details how credit information is collected and how the three main credit bureaus, Experian, TransUnion, and Equifax, aggregate your FICO score. Tony lays out how the scores are calculated, with payment history making up 35% of the score, credit utilization making up 30%, length of history with 15%, and credit mix with 10%.

Some common blunders that Tony has seen when working with pharmacists include having no credit or limited credit history, maxing out a 0% interest rate credit card, and relying on third-party credit tools for an accurate FICO score. Tony further shares that clients may not be checking credit reports and correcting errors that may appear on those reports. During the home loan process, borrowers have also made the credit blunders of co-signing for a loan without fully knowing how it would impact their credit and applying for credit for large purchases like a car or furniture for the whole before the sale is final. The lender knows and can see those last-minute credit applications and changes, and those changes can impact your loan approval.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Tony, welcome back to the show.

Tony Umholtz: Hey, Tim. It’s good to be here.

Tim Ulbrich: Excited to have you back on. And last time we had you on was Episode 204, where we talked about the current state of buying, selling, and refinancing a home. And we’re going to link to that episode in the show notes. But Tony, before we jump into the meat of today’s episode, give us the update from your perspective on what’s happening out there in the home buying market. Anything cooling off?

Tony Umholtz: Well, you know, it depends on what you mean by cooling off. It’s still — we’re still kind of dealing with a lot of the same challenges we’ve had this past year with inventory levels are still very, very low. But there’s still a lot of demand from home buyers. And you know, hopefully we’ll see some of that additional inventory come online soon. But with interest rates continuing to decline throughout the summer, there’s still a lot of demand for both new purchases and refinances.

Tim Ulbrich: I suspected as much as interest rates came back down. I know we saw a little bit of a jump up and have come back down since. So appreciate the perspective that you share on that. And so today’s episode, the idea for this episode came from a conversation Tony and I had back on Episode 191 where we talked about 10 common mortgage mistakes to avoid. And on that episode, one of those mistakes we talked about was credit. But we wanted to dig deeper, knowing that there’s a lot more to discuss and also to hear from Tony as he can share more about some of the experiences and what he sees folks making often in terms of credit mistakes that might have an impact on their lending situation and through the process. And so you know, these mistakes could lead to surprises, which surprises during the home process, home buying process, are certainly not good things. We want to avoid that. And that could be surprises in the form of a higher interest rate or surprise credit score. And again, we want to do everything that we can to avoid that and making sure that we’re ready and prepared going into the home buying and into the lending process. Tony, before we get into the common mistakes that you see folks making around credit when purchasing a home, let’s start with the mechanics. How does credit information get into one’s lending application? When does this happen? And how does a borrower get rated?

Tony Umholtz: Great question. And you know, there’s really three large repositories that aggregate all of our information as consumers. And that’s Equifax, Experian, and Transunion. So those are the three main bureaus that are out there that are gathering all the data on our credit histories. So for example, you know, any credit cards that we may have, even starting as young as 18 years old, you know, installment loans, car loans, anything — mortgage loans, student loans, all these types of creditors are evaluated by the three bureaus. So they aggregate all the data, our payment history, our performance, how long we’ve had credit, so those are essentially the three bureaus that are kind of watching us, so to speak.

Tim Ulbrich: And I want to dig in a little bit further about the impact one’s credit score can have on their application, ultimately the interest rate in terms of they’re able to access. So before we look at the numbers, remind us the components of one’s credit score, Tony. I’m specifically thinking here about the FICO score.

Tony Umholtz: Yes. So you know, typically when we look at the FICO score — and we’re starting to see a re-emergence of other scoring models, but the primary driver of our credit scores is going to be our payment history. So payment history is by far the biggest driver of our credit score. So meaning on time payments, not having a 30-day delinquency. And I want to just touch on this for a minute because it’s something that’s come up a lot over my career, my nearly 20 years in the business is let’s just say — we just had this incident with one of my borrowers this past week where they did not get a credit card statement. They were selling their house prior to buying the new home they were buying. And he missed a credit card statement that came to the home. And if it’s over 30 days late, you’re reported to the bureaus. So if it’s 15 days late, you’re not reported to the bureaus as a delinquency. But if it’s over 30 days, then it becomes late. So it’s — that’s a question that comes up a lot. And unfortunately, it’s something we had to navigate here at the last minute.

Tim Ulbrich: Oh man.

Tony Umholtz: But payment history is the biggest driver. The next would be credit utilization. And that primarily is going to be driven on revolving credit accounts. And what I mean by revolving credit accounts is going to be your credit cards that you might have or lines of credit. And those are essentially going to be evaluated based upon how much you have borrowed on that card. For example, I always advise people to try to stay at 50-70% of their credit limits. And what that means — so let’s say you had a $10,000 credit limit on your credit card and you ran it up to $9,000 balance. Well, that’s going to report adversely to the creditors, credit bureaus. And remember, credit utilization is 30% weighting of your score. It’s a big weighting. But that’s the other really big driver of your credit history. Those two alone are like 65% of the weighting of what determines your credit. And then the next couple I would say, just to add in here, is length of credit history, you know, the longer you’ve had credit, good credit, the better that’s going to weigh on your score. That’s usually about a 15% driver. And then your credit mix is about a 10% driver. So the types of credit you have is very important too. You know, do you have experience with — you know, a lot of times, people will come in before they buy their first home and they have maybe a car loan, student loans, credit cards, but they haven’t had a mortgage yet. And a lot of times the mortgage will add more — a stronger credit mix. It would be viewed stronger because it’s a bigger installment loan. It’s a little tougher to get. And then the last driver of your score is inquiries. A lot of people will call me and say, “Tony, the inquiries really hurt my score, and I don’t want this to damage my score.” But they really have the least amount of impact on your score. If you go and have a tremendous amount of them at one time, that can hit your credit a little bit. But normally, a couple of inquiries isn’t going to have much of an impact.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and it sounds like, Tony, you mentioned several components here, but low hanging fruit, you mentioned payment history, so on-time payments, and then credit utilization, how much of that balance is used each month in terms of the revolving amount. Those two alone making up more than 60%. So you know, I think being in tune of if you’re looking to really optimize credit, I think of some tips here that folks may want to consider, specifically with payment history and on-time payments, something like automatic payments, right? Obviously we want to make sure we’ve got the funds to pay that money, you know, in the account that that’s coming from, but the example you gave of someone not getting a mailed statement, hopefully folks can get electronic statements, you know, as a backup to help prevent that. But something like automatic payments can really help make sure that we don’t have something like that happen, especially if you’re in the midst of purchasing a property where the timing of that is less than ideal. I would also point folks here to an episode, 162. Tim Baker and I talked about Credit 101, and what Tony just mentioned there of the makeup of a FICO score was one part of that discussion. But we also talked about credit security, the importance of understanding your credit, how credit really is a thread across the financial plan, and so credit being a very important topic as it relates to the financial planning process. Tony, I’m someone listening today, and I feel like I’ve got a good idea of my credit score. And the question that comes to mind here is how significant of an impact can this have on securing the best rates and terms? And so you know, what I’m thinking of here is 30-year mortgage, maybe because of a higher or lower credit score, we’re looking at maybe a quarter of a percent. And maybe that doesn’t look as much of a big deal on paper as it actually can be mathematically, so tell me about what the impact of this might be.

Tony Umholtz: Well, the longer term the loan is, the more impactful your credit history — your credit scores are going to be. So it’s a good point, Tim, because you know, for example, if you have a 710 score versus a 740, you’re going to get probably about an eighth to a quarter better rate on a 30-year loan having over a 740. Typically on most of our mortgages, over 740 does not get much more benefit.

Tim Ulbrich: OK.

Tony Umholtz: So a 740 score versus an 800 score isn’t going to see a huge benefit. Some of the jumbo loans that get over $550,000 may see a little bit more of a benefit because they have some pricing matrices — the matrix will go up to 780 or higher. But where you really see the impact is like if you’re under 700, right, and you’re at 660 versus even a 700, talking about a large margin risk profile added to the loan, especially on a 30-year fixed. One thing I do want to mention that I think it’s important is the shorter the term, especially on a 15-year fixed, the more flexibility you have with the credit score. So I’ve even had some customers that have been under 700 and it really impacted their 30-year rate, but the 15-year rate stayed the same because the hits don’t really adjust to that until you get even lower because a lower term, you’re paying back the loan faster.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, that makes sense. And I would encourage folks, even though that may not seem significant, eighth of a percent, quarter of a percent, when you’re talking about Tony’s comment, a 30-year mortgage, $400,000 or $500,000 home, you know, that can start to add up in terms of obviously difference in monthly payment because of that interest as well as the difference in what you’re going to pay over the life of the loan. And here, we start to think about opportunity costs, right? Where else might that be used in other parts of the financial plan, whether it be investing, other debt repayment, and so forth. So now that we’ve talked about the makeup of the FICO and really understanding that score components and the impact that that might have, let’s talk about some of the common mistakes that you see, Tony, folks that make when they’re applying for really any loan but here, we’re going to talk about the pharmacist home loan a little bit more specifically. And the first one I have here is no or limited credit history. So we’ve been talking for the last five minutes or so about the importance that, you know, a higher credit score can have in getting more favorable rates and terms. So if someone’s listening and they have limited credit history or no credit history, what are the problems that can present themselves there? And what are some of the solutions that they can pursue?

Tony Umholtz: Well, it’s one of those things where especially if you’re young, it’s hard to come right in with very established credit. But I would suggest, I mean, just a couple points here. You know, one thing that — and I didn’t realize, and I’ll just take my own example. But I remember my first day, first month let’s just say, of my freshman year of college, there was a credit card company on campus where you could get a credit card, right? And being the finance major that I am, I was one of those guys that didn’t charge much but used it here and there. And it helped me with my credit history. And I’ve seen that. If you can get even a small credit card even in college, even if it’s got a couple hundred dollar limit, and you use it as a wise steward, right, you’re not out there running it up, I think that’s a great way to start building your credit. That really helped me because I had a solid credit score coming out of college. And I see that with other people too. Now, student loans being paid on time, that all helps as well because student loans will show up quickly too. I do have a situation now with a client that we’ve had to like rebuild their — they had no credit. They had zero credit history, right? So there’s no score. And that becomes a real challenge, especially — I mean, for example, the pharmacist home loan, we do — you don’t have to have a real in-depth credit history. You really can have a fairly young credit history, but you have to have a score. You know, we have to know what that score is. The only other option we have if you have no credit score that we have available is FHA where we essentially kind of have to build your credit history to some degree. But that’s kind of a rare thing these days. But that’s — every now and then, we run into that. I would just say to start building it early. Having some credit is not a bad thing. Just be responsible with it.

Tim Ulbrich: Tony, I’ve heard you say that before about for those that have no or limited credit history, the FHA is an option and building credit. Tell me more about what you mean by that.

Tony Umholtz: So when we say building credit, we essentially are using other types of forms — like for example, you might have paid auto insurance, right, or utility bills, or rent. We’re able to pull some of these other types of elements of payment history together to show responsibility and the ability to repay. So those are some of the things that we’ll actually use to build the credit history as well as we suggest to get a credit card or something to that effect to — depending on their timing and when they want to buy to start developing that so they can at least get a score. But having a score is pretty critical to get the best loans, you know. Really the only one that we have out there is FHA that will allow us to work without a credit score.

Tim Ulbrich: Got you. Another common mistake I’ve heard you mention is, you know, folks that might have purchased an appliance, piece of furniture, there’s several examples of this, on a 0% interest card and not realized the impact that that might have when they’re going through the lending process and purchasing a home. Tell us more about that.

Tony Umholtz: You know, this is another one, Tim, that I learned firsthand personally when I was young and lots of my — I’ve seen it many times over the years with my clients, but you know, I’ll give the example of buying furniture. Fortunately, I did this after I bought my home. I was 25 I think at the time. It was a long time ago. But essentially, I went into a furniture store, was able to buy all this furniture, and they said, “Hey, by the way, that $4,800 in furniture, we’ll give you a credit card where you don’t have to pay interest for over a year.” I said, “Well, that sounds great. Let’s do it.” And you won’t have to make payments for over a year. Well, unfortunately, how those credit cards work — and they’re in all sorts of retail goods. It’s not just furniture. There’s a lot of different promotions out there. It reports to the bureaus as a maxed-out credit card. So you know, a lot of electronics companies are the same way. They’ll offer this to you. And you’ve just got to beware because it’ll report to the bureaus as a maxed-out credit card. And as we discussed, 30% of our weighting of our credit score is based upon credit utilization. If we show a maxed-out credit card, that’s going to be a big hit to our score. And I see that a lot. It’s unfortunate. But it comes up a lot.

Tim Ulbrich: And you taught me that, Tony. I did not know that that was often viewed as a maxed-out credit card. So obviously what we just learned about FICO and utilization, that makes a whole lot of sense of the impact that that could have. So we talked about no or limited credit history, we talked about buying an appliance or piece of furniture or something like that on a 0% card. The other thing I’ve heard you mention several times — and I think we’re seeing more and more as folks are using more of these tools — would be relying on a third-party credit app or tool, whether it be something like CreditKarma, CreditSesame, when we’re relying on that for credit score information that may not match up necessarily with what you’re seeing on the lending side. Is that correct?

Tony Umholtz: That’s right, Tim. Yeah. That’s right. And I think this is an important topic because there’s a lot of variables out there. And I don’t want to say that these like a CreditKarma and some of the other apps and trackers aren’t legitimate and helpful. They certainly are. And they give you a good idea of the trend of your credit score and how you’re performing. The one thing I would caution everyone on, though, is it’s not typically indicative of what your score is to a creditor. Now, mortgage companies in particular, we run what’s called a tri-merge report, which is all three bureaus. So we’re going to see Equifax, Experian, and Transunion’s, each of them give us a score, provide us a score. And we take the median score. So mortgage lenders take the media score where — and the same thing would apply for like a commercial loan if you’re getting commercial loan for a building or something of substance. An auto company, if you’re buying a car, will often just pull one. So they may just pull Experian, right? Or Equifax. So you know, a lot of times there is a little bit of variability in our scores. And they can be different. Our Equifax score could be potentially be 750, our Experian could be 739, and our Transunion might be 730. Well in that case, you’re at 739, not over 740. And that’s where I see the mistake come up because a lot of these trackers will show you a score that’s a little higher than what we would see. And a lot of my customers send me — my clients will say, “Hey, here’s my report, here’s my credit score.” And it’s oftentimes a lot different than what we pull. But I think there’s a lot coming on scores over the next couple years. I think you’ll see different ways of risk assessment. It hasn’t hit us yet, but I think rental performance will come into play more too. It’s important to always pay our rents on time. You know, traditionally that didn’t always come up on reports. But I think there’s going to be some other elements that are going to potentially help us. And I think you’ll see that the medical collections take less weight on the reports. We’re already seeing that too, which is really a blessing for a lot of people that have had things happen.

Tim Ulbrich: Tony, I can see this playing out. You know, you gave a good example where somebody might be on that line, let’s say a 740, and they think because of what they see on CreditKarma or CreditSesame that they’re going to be above that and then come to find out that they’re not, and that obviously can have a surprise and be an impact on rates. And you know, I’m sure — it reminds me of the patient that might walk through the doors of the pharmacy and be upset with the pharmacist because of what they get through claims adjudication on the insurance side. And the pharmacist is often not deciding that price, but the reality is they’re the person that’s in front of the patient. And I suspect here, that can be much of the same where they may be surprised and take it out on you guys sometimes.

Tony Umholtz: It happens.

Tim Ulbrich: It happens, right?

Tony Umholtz: We’re the messenger.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah. It’s an emotional process.

Tony Umholtz: It is. One thing that we find that’s been helping too is we have a tool as part of our platform here that can actually tell — we can see what credit — what the scoring potential for a client based upon activities they could do to their report such as paying down debt, consolidating a card or whatever it might be. So it actually — we are able to a lot of times add some value to help people get their scores a little higher. We’ve had a lot of success with that.

Tim Ulbrich: The next one I have here, Tony, is borrowers that may not be checking their credit reports and therefore identifying and correcting any errors that could lead to higher rates. And this one is really something that I find interesting. You know, I do an activity in a personal finance course that I teach where I have folks actually go out, pull their credit reports, analyze them, and then they write a reflection on kind of what they learned. And the trends I have found is that about 50% of the students No. 1, have never checked credit before, have never run a credit report. And then the number of folks that are surprised by what they find on that credit report. So any insights here, even any examples that come to mind of where this can be problematic, especially when you’re in the midst of trying to secure a loan and secure a loan at the best rate?

Tony Umholtz: I think it’s really important for everyone to take advantage of the free credit reports that are out there. You know, the annualcreditreport.com. You’re allowed to have one copy from each bureau per year. And I think that’s something that we all need to do. And the surprises I think are hey, I thought I canceled that credit card years ago, right? And sometimes having open credit — it doesn’t hurt you. But you may not want to have a whole bunch of things out there just from a fraud risk potential. But — and making sure that you’re not attached to things you don’t want to be attached to. You just — in this day and age, you never know, and especially if you get into partnerships and cosigning and things like that, you’ve got to be really careful about what you’re attached to and knowing what entities your credit, you’re attached to. That’s one thing I would just caution because I’ve seen some problems come up with cosigning and people not being aware that they did or applications from everything from student loans to auto loans to business loans. And then just there is a lot of fraud out there, you know? And I think that I’m on LifeLock. I’m not trying to promote anything, I just, I’ve put that on me and my wife’s accounts just so we know what’s going on, right, in case anything ever were to happen we’d be made aware. But certainly would encourage everyone to do that. And you know, I think just knowing what’s out there. I know when I did it one time, I had a credit card that I hadn’t used in like 6-7 years and it was still open, right? If you don’t use it, might want to close it.

Tim Ulbrich: And I’m glad you mentioned the cosigner because I do think that’s something that we hear and see often from the community, whether that’s student loans, whether that’s auto loans, whatever be the situation, obviously there’s a potential risk there of late payments, somebody may or may not be aware of that and the impact that that could have during the credit and obviously impact that could have on your credit and then the surprise that could present during the lending process. Tony, last one I want to talk about here before we wrap up by talking about the pharmacist home loan product is applying for credit before sale is final. And I think many of us who have gone through this process, we’ve gotten the advice of, do as little as you can in terms of new credit or inquiries or anything during this process. But give us some more details, not only why is this important but what is the time period that we should be thinking about this because I sense that there are listeners out there that might be buying a home and also be thinking about refinancing their loans, for example.

Tony Umholtz: Right. And this one is really important, guys, if you’re in process for a home loan because us lenders, we know what you’ve applied for during the process. We’re notified if you secure a new loan. So for example, one that comes up a lot is a new auto loan, a — furniture for the home. I’ve seen that quite a bit. And a lot of our clients are proactive and ask the question first. And we will look and see. If it’s something like hey, my car absolutely won’t work anymore, I need to get a new one, we’ll look and see, will that impact you. We’ll include that new payment into your numbers so it doesn’t affect your home closing. But normally, you want to try to postpone any activity, new credit, when you’re in the mortgage process until after you close just because there’s a lot of risk there, right? It’s a big transaction. You do not want to jeopardize it with new credit because we do know about it. We will know. We are notified if you open anything up. And that’s a really important point if you’re in the process. So I would just caution everyone to be very careful with that. And I will give the classic example. Before they tracked, this is going back probably 2005, I remember I went to this closing for a client of mine, and it was a fairly nice home. And he goes, “Hey, Tony, look at my new car I bought last week!” And the guy had bought a new Porsche, right? This is before we had the trackers. I’m like, don’t tell me this. Oh, don’t tell me that. But anyway, nowadays, we do know what activity has happened. And be very careful. And if you have to do something, just speak to your lender first before you officially apply for any other types of credit during the process.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and that’s where my mind was going, Tony, just knowing the examples that might come here, right? It could be credit, we talked about some of these already, furniture, appliances, student loans, auto loans. Like there’s a lot of things that could come up here, and I think just open communication with the lender if you have questions to make sure that you’re not doing anything that’s going to jeopardize obviously, again, the goal here being that we get the best loan at the best term, you know, and ultimately the best rate so that we can keep the cost of interest low throughout the life of the loan. So Tony, we’ve talked about the makeup of the FICO score, understanding what feeds into that score. We talked about the impact that that could have on someone’s rate and their ability to secure that competitive rate. We talked about some of the common mistakes that you see folks making around credit in the home buying. And I think this is a good connection to the pharmacist home loan product. And I know many of our community members are familiar with this from previous episodes, information we have on the website, but for folks that are hearing this for the first time, give us some more information about the pharmacist home loan, what is it, how it’s different from other options that are out there in terms of down payment, PMI, minimum credit scores, and so forth.

Tony Umholtz: Sure. I mean, again, just a great tool for pharmacists to purchase a home. And the main points of it is you’re able to buy a home — if you’re a first-time home buyer, you could put down as little as 3% and have no PMI. And if you’ve owned a home before, it’s 5% down with no PMI. And that’s significant savings not having the MI but also the interest rates tend to be better than I can offer with a 20% down normal conventional loan for someone else, which is quite a nice opportunity for people. And the minimum credit score is 700. So it doesn’t have like a super high credit threshold. And it’s flexible on reserves and things like that. You know, some programs have very strict reserve requirements, and this one has some flexibility there, has some flexibility on how we value student loans, and you don’t have to be — you know, one of the other things that a lot of doctor loan programs have out there is some of them have restrictions if you’ve been out of residency for 10 years, you can’t use the product. This one does not have those limitations. So it’s — it’s been a great tool for a lot of people. And we’re very pleased that we can offer it.

Tim Ulbrich: And we’ll put Tony’s contact information in the show notes for folks that want to reach out to Tony directly. Also, if you haven’t already done so, make sure to check out — we’ve got a great comprehensive post, very informational, that I think you’ll find helpful, “Five Steps to Getting a Home Loan.” And you can — in that blog post, which we’ll link to in the show notes — learn more about the pharmacist home loan product. We’ve got some calculators there as well. And that’s available at YourFinancialPharmacist.com/home-loan. Again, that’s “Five Steps to Getting a Home Loan” at YourFinancialPharmacist.com/home-loan. Tony, as always, appreciate your insights, your expertise in this area, and thank you for the time coming on the show.

Tony Umholtz: Hey, Tim, thanks for having me. It was great to be here.

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YFP 215: Know Yourself, Know Your Money with New York Times Bestseller Rachel Cruze

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Know Yourself, Know Your Money with New York Times Bestseller Rachel Cruze

Rachel Cruze discusses her new book, Know Yourself, Know Your Money.

About Today’s Guest

Rachel Cruze is a two-time #1 national best-selling author, financial expert, and host of The Rachel Cruze Show. Since 2010, Rachel has served at Ramsey Solutions, where she teaches people to avoid debt, save money, budget, and how to win with money at any stage in life. She’s authored three best-selling books, including her latest, Know Yourself, Know Your Money: Discover WHY You Handle Money the Way You Do and WHAT to Do About It. Follow Rachel on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube or online at rachelcruze.com.

Summary

National best-selling author and financial expert, Rachel Cruze, joins Tim Ulbrich to discuss her newest book, Know Yourself, Know Your Money: Discover WHY You Handle Money the Way You Do and WHAT to Do About It. Tim and Rachel delve into various portions of the book, highlighting specific lessons and concepts relatable to pharmacists, parents, and anyone interested in learning more about themselves and their relationship to their finances.

Rachel walks listeners through “Discovering Your Personal Money Mindset,” including how we form our ideas about money and how we learn to handle money as we do through “Your Childhood Money Classroom.” Rachel goes through the four money classrooms. She reminds us that regardless of the quadrant that you grew up in, you can choose your quadrant from this point forward. Rachel outlines seven money tendencies, how they not only impact your financial picture, and how these tendencies affect interpersonal relationships with significant others. Tim and Rachel share an earnest discussion about money fears, detailed in Chapters 5 and 6 of the book. They close with an eye-opening discussion on part 2 of the book, focusing on the “Power of Contentment.” Rachel shares how contentment changes your motivation for spending. She explains a practical exercise for determining what brings you joy and demonstrates how learning where and how you find happiness allows you to focus your spending on what is truly important to you.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Rachel, welcome to the show.

Rachel Cruze: Yeah, thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it.

Tim Ulbrich: It’s really an honor to have you on, and I’m excited to talk about your latest book, “Know Yourself, Know Your Money.” And for those listening in the YFP community that are already familiar with the Ramsey baby steps, I think this book does an excellent job covering much of the mindset, the behaviors, the beliefs that are the foundation to ensuring your goals and dreams become a reality. So Rachel, in Part 1 of the book, which is “Discovering Your Personal Money Mindset,” you talk in Chapter 1 about your childhood money classroom. And you make a strong argument that this is the first step in understanding why we handle money the way that we do and that “there are really two ways we learned about money: what our parents communicated emotionally and what they communicated verbally.” Tell us more about these two modes of communication and why it is so important to dig into our past for some honest reflection before we chart our path forward.

Rachel Cruze: Yes, well whenever you talk to any great psychologist or counselor or therapist, they will tell you that so much of who you are today is from how you grew up, whether that’s coping mechanisms, defense strategies, all of that. Learning to kind of survive really in your childhood is something that’s engrained in all of us. And so when I was writing the book, I wanted to go in and say, “OK, I want to understand why we handle money the way we do.” Like you said, it’s not just the what — you know, we talk about the how a lot around Ramsey Solutions, how to get out of debt, how to invest, how to refinance, how to give, but I wanted to answer that question, why? Why do we do the things we do? And it always stems back to that classroom that you lived in, which is your home growing up. And there’s a lot of lessons in those classrooms that we grew up in that you want to unlearn. As an adult, you’re like, I don’t want to take that with me. And there’s a lot of lessons that you do want to take with you. And so being able to just pinpoint, hey, my money habits, the way I view money, part of that is because of my environment growing up. And so those two modes of communication, like you said, the verbal, what is said out loud, and then that emotional state, is really important. So as I was writing the manuscript for this book, you know, kind of coming across these two things, and I remember thinking, oh, OK, it’s like a quadrant. God gave me a graph to explain this, and I’m so happy because it ends up being this four quadrant where that verbal communication and emotional communication intersect. And it ends up really showing these four different money classrooms. And so for you to be able to identify OK, I grew up in Classroom No. 1 or Classroom No. 2 there, and to understand that really will show you why you handle money the way you do today.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and this was really a gut check for me, Rachel, as a father of four young boys, you know, I feel like I do a decent job in communicating verbally about money. It’s something I talk about daily, but it was a gut check on like the emotional part and what are some of the messages that we’re sending to our kids? And so part of this as I read it is unlearning in part or reflecting upon your past but also for those that are out there that are parents, thinking about some of the money scripts and messages that we’re sending in our own homes as well.

Rachel Cruze: That’s right. Yeah. And even that nonverbal, you know, in the classroom, Classroom 1 is the anxious money classroom. And that’s where it’s verbally closed but emotionally stressed. Classroom 2 is the unstable money classroom where it’s emotionally stressed but verbally open, so it’s lots of conflict, lots of fighting. That Classroom 3 is the unaware money classroom, which is emotionally calm but it’s verbally closed. So it’s not talked about, but it’s also not felt. Like it’s a stress point, so you don’t really even — your head is kind of in the sand, if you will, about money until you leave home and realize, oh wow, there’s a lot to do with this subject. And then Classroom 4 is that secure money classroom. And that’s where it’s verbally open but emotionally calm. So that fourth classroom, kind of like what you’re saying, I really wanted the readers to think about their current nuclear family to say, OK, if I do have kids or if I want kids in the future, how am I going to do this on the verbal and emotional scale? And so moving to that Classroom 4 is really important for people because the thing about that is you don’t have to be a perfect parents by any means to be in that classroom. You also don’t have to have a ton of money, right? You don’t have to be like a millionaire to be in that. It’s these habits that you create. And what’s funny is when you’re emotionally calm about money, usually there’s a plan around it, usually there’s a level of healthy control. There’s some safety nets in place like an emergency fund, you know, there’s these habits that you do in the how-to of money that set you up to create that emotionally stable home around this subject where for so many people it’s not safe, it’s not emotionally calm, it is very stressed. And when you look at the statistics of the average American today, I’m like, yeah, I would be stressed too, right? Living paycheck-to-paycheck, having $16,000 of credit card debt, all of it. So I understand why that is, but getting yourself in a place financially where you’re more under control, you’re naturally going to bring in that emotional side in your household, which is amazing. And then the verbal side you pointed out too is talking about it. And I think it’s less taboo today than it was even 20 years ago. I think parents engage their kids in more conversations maybe than the Boomers did for their kids, you know, like when you look at the different generational differences. But again, engaging it and showing the mechanics but also the other side of it of hey, here’s what contentment looks like. Here’s what generosity does to your heart and your viewpoint in life. I mean, you know, bringing in those hard and soft subjects of money are important to talk to about with kids.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I love, Rachel, how you take folks through this journey of understanding these four different classrooms you mentioned in the quadrant. And it can be heavy to kind of walk through and reflect on some of this. But you end Chapter 3 where you talk about calm money classrooms, you end Chapter 3 by reassuring us that our childhood does not define us. You say, “Your childhood may have given you a rocky start, but it doesn’t make or break you, regardless of the household you grew up in. You get to choose your quadrant from this point forward.” What an awesome view, right? We learn from the past, but we’ve got an opportunity to chart a new path going forward.

Rachel Cruze: That’s right, yeah. I mean, there’s so much hope and I think even in the money piece of my messages that I communicate with people is like no matter what mistakes you’ve made, yeah, maybe you do have a ton of debt. So on a more logistical side, yeah, maybe you have a deeper hole to dig out of than the person next to you, but no matter what, you get to make the decisions to say, no, I actually want to change how I view something or the habits around money. And the same is true with your classroom. Some people, a lot of people I would say, grew up in a hard environment when it came to money with their parents. But yet you don’t have to just mirror that story, right? You can take charge of your life to say, you know what, I’m not going to sit here and bash my parents, but I’m also not going to defend them. I’m going to just tell the truth of what happened, and here’s the truth. OK, there’s some good stuff, and there’s some bad stuff. And the bad stuff I can forgive, and I’m going to move forward though to choose something different for my life and my family. And I think it’s powerful. And I think we have to do that in all of parenting. I’m not a parenting expert by any means, but I’m like, you know, my husband and I have said, OK, this is our family. What are we going to choose to do in this? And so the money pieces is part of that.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. And give yourself some grace along the way, right?

Rachel Cruze: That’s right. Oh, absolutely. There’s hope in grace. Absolutely.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. Rachel, in Chapter 4, which is “Your Unique Money Tendencies,” you introduce seven major money tendencies. And we’re not going to go through all of these, but I’ll read them off quickly. And those seven are save or spender, nerd or free spirit, experiences or things, quality or quantity, safety or status, abundance or scarcity, and planned giving or spontaneous giving. And I want to break down one of these further that I suspect our audience has heard of before, and that is the concept of being a nerd or being a free spirit. And so this as one example of these different tendencies, tell us more about the difference between these two and why each really has its own benefits and challenges and we want to think about these on a scale.

Rachel Cruze: Yes. Well, when I did these seven tendencies, I didn’t want one to be right or wrong because I feel like that can happen a lot. You know, it’s just no, these are naturally where you’re bent, and if you go to the extremes of any of these tendencies, that can get unhealthy. Kind of that middle ground is to say, ‘OK, I’m naturally bent towards this, but I can actually have a little bit of both,’ which makes you I think more well-rounded, honestly. But yeah, the nerd and free spirit, that was kind of a phrase that was coined, two terms that were coined by my dad, honestly, about probably 20 years ago talking about the budget specifically and how I make it a little bit more broad in just the idea of how you view money, but one of you — or if you’re married, usually opposites attract. But you either lean toward a nerd, which is the one that yeah, you’re just organized, you probably have Excel spreadsheets all over the place, you love to budget, you love to feel in control, you know what’s going on, you keep up with everything, numbers are your friends, it feels great to know what’s going on. And so that nerd is naturally going to be bent one way towards money, which obviously is more the control factor. Sometimes more the scarcity mindset, they want to just know what’s going on. And then the free spirit is on the opposite end, and that’s the person that is more hey, everything is going to work out. It’s fine, it’s fine. A budget to them, it feels restrictive. It feels like there’s no fun in life if I have to live on a budget, that means I have to say no a lot, and I don’t want to say no. I want to say yes because you only live once, you know? It’s a little bit more of that mentality. And what’s funny is I actually lean more free spirit in who I am, so this money stuff and budgeting, some of it was hard for me to say, OK, I have to learn this because I don’t have to become a nerd to be good at money. That’s not the reason behind this. But it is to say, “Hey, there are qualities that I need to pick up,” because if I’m a free spirit on the extreme of the free spirit side, I’m probably going to be broke. I’m probably going to have lots of debt because I’m not keeping up with anything, I’m just doing what I want in the moment, what feels good. And that’s not wise. But I also don’t have to absolutely love numbers like my husband. He is more of the nerd. Like I mean, he has spreadsheets. He’s like all about the five-year goal and what’s going in each month, looking at the mutual funds. I mean, he just loves it. And I’m like, I’m the money person that talks about this every day, and I don’t love it that much. Like I’ll do the budget and track transactions, but that’s about it. So again, it’s just pinpointing hey, here’s where I lean, here’s places I can learn, and here’s some really great things about that side of the nerd or great things about the free spirit. And then if you’re married, again, it’s good to call that too because I think in marriage, money can be such a difficult subject. But to be able to say, “OK, you’re not my enemy in this. You’re just more of a nerd in that or you’re more of a free spirit, so how can we come together and work as a team?”

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, you do a great job in the book going through each one of these sets that I mentioned and not only what they are and some of the differences and where that balance might but also some great exercises at the end of the chapter where folks can reflect upon those, and I think it would be great conversation starters as well for couples that are going through this together. Rachel, Chapters 5 and 6, it gets real, right? You start to talk about your money fears, six of them in total. And I want to pick apart the fear that you say is the most common one you see, which is not having enough. And essentially, this is if something bad happens, the fear that I won’t survive financially. And as you talk about in the book, this could be job loss, this could be a huge health bill, this could be a major house issue. And really, the list can go on and on of all of the things that might go wrong. And it could be a today thing, a today fear, or it could be a future fear. For example, will I have enough when it comes time to retirement? And I think this quickly becomes overwhelming and for many can become paralyzing. And as you say in the book, the “what if” question, it’s a scary question. And so tell us more here, how can we face this fear head-on without it ultimately paralyzing us to take action with our financial plan?

Rachel Cruze: Yeah, when we talk about fear — for this book, I did a lot of research around it because usually fear is just seen as a 100% bad thing, right? Face your fears, don’t let your fear hold you back, all that. Well, some of that, yes, is very true. I remember talking to Dr. Chip Dodd about this, and I loved what he said because he said, fear can actually be a gift. Fear is your body’s response that you are in need of something. Now, again, when that fear becomes paralyzing or turns into anxiety, like any of that, we don’t want that. But just that initial fear, OK, what is that telling you? Because it actually could be telling you something that you need to listen to to diminish that fear. So for a lot of people — and gosh, we just walked through 2020, right, which was just the craziest year I think of all of our lives, around this. And so you could say, OK, my fear is that if something happens, am I going to be OK? If we lose a job, am I going to be OK? Well, you look at your situation and again, just pulling in just stats that I know that 78% of Americans live paycheck-to-paycheck, the average car payment is around $548, the average family owes $16,000 just on their credit cards. So you put all that together and if something happens, are you going to be OK? Well yeah, you’re going to be able to literally survive. But financially, you’re going to be in a mess. You’re going to be in a mess if you don’t have another paycheck to pay these bills. So let’s look at the reality of what’s going on. Again, it’s not to paralyze you, but it’s to say, OK, what can I do now to get in better control of my money? Am I budgeting? Am I living on less than I make? Do I have an emergency fund? And do I have a goal that I’m working towards that actually puts my money towards something, right? Am I giving? Like am I doing these things? And for a lot of people, if they say, “No, I’m not,” hopefully it’s a little bit of a motivator. I don’t think fear has to be the only motivator, but I think it’s a good jumpstart to it of OK, let’s get some things in place so that we can say, OK, maybe you look up in 24, 36 months, three years down the road, and you’re completely debt-free, you have a fully-funded emergency fund of 3-6 months worth of expenses. You now have retirement planned out, you know how much you’re putting in each month, like you actually have a plan in place. And what caused that may have been that fear of wow, if I lose one paycheck, this entire thing just implodes is what it feels like. So again, let that fear drive you. And again, it’s a big one, that fear of am I going to be OK? And what’s interesting is prior to 2020, it was women’s top financial fear. So for some men, it was oh, there’s a dream that I have that I can’t get to because of my life or you fill in the lank. But women day-in and day-out, consistently when surveyed, it was am I going to be OK? And then I think you fast forward to 2021, I don’t have hard data for this, but I would say a lot of people now are in that bucket.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely.

Rachel Cruze: Because of what we walked through. So again, I want this fear to not turn into something that’s super unhealthy, but I want it to be a little bit of that jumpstart to say OK, is this rational? OK, maybe it is. So maybe I need to change some things. But then also I’ll tell you this too: It could be irrational. I mean, my husband and I have been doing this plan for 11 years of marriage, so we are, we’re debt-free — I mean, we’ve done it to the t. And it works, No. 1, I can say that. I’m the proof. But No. 2, even during the pandemic, I had a few nights where I went to bed thinking, oh my gosh, are we going to be OK? But what allowed me a little bit to have that safety is realizing No. 1, black-and-white on paper, the numbers, yes, we’re going to be fine because we’ve been doing this, we’ve been diligent. But also No. 2, Rachel, it’s a little bit of a wakeup call for me emotionally to say why am I so fearful that this foundation that I’ve set, this financial foundation, that if it was shook, who am I? Right? And it made me do a gut check, honestly, to say OK, where is my identity? Where have I been putting value? Because money, while we need to be responsible with it and we want to be able to do things like get out of debt and build wealth and change our family tree and be generous to others, all of these wonderful things, money is not our God. And if it’s the thing day-in and day-out that you’re looking toward, it’s not going to fulfill you. And I kind of got to a place where I had to do a gut check on myself last year to think, OK, who am I emotionally on that side, right, if that foundation is shaken? So again, this fear conversation I think is a really important one to have. And I think it’s a really good one to have.

Tim Ulbrich: I do too. And I think it can be motivating for the reasons that you mentioned. Our listeners have heard me say many times about really building a strong financial foundation and think about what the building blocks of that are. But there are challenges that can be had in the security of that foundation and what you’re ultimately putting that security in. So I think a great reminder. And this section of the book, as I mentioned, really powerful. You talked through several other fears. We’re just scratching the surface here. You talk about the fears of not realizing your dreams, of not being capable, external fears, past mistakes, repeating the past, you know, all types of things that we want to be considering. So I hope folks will pick up a copy of the book and check that out. Rachel, Part 2 of the book, “Discovering What You Do With Money and Why,” you connect the information the reader learns in Part 1 so that it can then be applied to their personal situation. And one thing that stood out to me in this section was the concept that you talk about, the power of contentment. And you say that “contentment is a process that changes your motivation for spending money.” Tell us more about that.

Rachel Cruze: Yeah, contentment I think is a huge piece of this financial conversation that has to be in place because money is like a magnifying glass. It makes you more of what you already are. And so if you are a discontent person and you think — and it’s all of us, you know, at different times in life for sure and maybe different parts of the day too, so I’m not speaking out of that I have found the answer to it all — but realizing though if we live in a discontentment state, which usually results in OK, if I can just make x amount of money, if I can just buy this kind of car, if I can go on that kind of vacation, if I live in this kind of house, then everything is going to be fixed. And we think that in our culture in our country that our problems are fixed by stuff. And that discontentment is just magnified, and the problem is that if you build wealth and you actually have the money to go and get these things, you get the things, and it doesn’t fulfill you and you’re discontent again with just more stuff around you. And so there’s that heart piece that I think is important to keep in check. And for me, it’s calling out to people, OK, what are the things in your life that money — there’s not a price tag towards. And this was kind of my journey even just last year, I thought, Rachel, what are the things in my life that I can’t pay for. Well, that’s a great marriage, having children that I am trying to raise in the best way possible, my health, my spiritual walk, my family, you know, my friendships, like relationships. So kind of mapping those things out and realizing OK, if I can invest my time and my energy in those things, life is so much richer, right? And again, not that it doesn’t mean you can’t have a great house or go on a great vacation. My husband and I just got back on Saturday from a fun trip that him and I just took, you know, for a few nights. It was fantastic. It was wonderful. But those things don’t fulfill you, right? It’s the fact that I was with my husband. And we got to have that time together. That is what was fulfilling. And so all of that I think stems to that contentment, and that contentment piece, again, I think is — we tried to find it in stuff, and I really push people to find it in things that money can’t buy.

Tim Ulbrich: My favorite part of the book, Rachel, is that you make a really good case for the importance of connecting saving and dreaming. Saving and dreaming. And we talk a lot on this show about having a strong financial why. And this chapter reminded me of that concept. You say that, “Not having any savings is a worrying sign for two big problems. The first problem is that your house isn’t in order. You’re not prepared. But not having savings is also a worrying sign of a second problem: that you’re not tuned into your dreams.” What do you mean by this?

Rachel Cruze: Well, when I did this part of the book, you know, I wanted to kind of walk through OK, why do we spend the way we spend? Why do we save the way we save? Why do we give the way we give? And so when I was in that saving section, I was like, OK, why do we save the way we save? And I’m like, well, what are the things we save for? What are the — I’m like, well, it’s because we have these dreams. Is it to build a house one day? Is it to be debt-free? You know, whatever it is, and that gives purpose behind our dollars. It gives us purpose to say OK, when the money comes in, I actually know where it’s going. It’s going to something that I value in life. And that’s what makes things rich, right? That’s what brings joy. And people that just live life and they’re not intentional, it’s just kind of that paycheck-to-paycheck, I go to work, I get paid, I just keep doing the same thing. And you look up in five years and not much has changed about your life, I bet your savings hasn’t changed either because you don’t have a goal, you don’t have something you’re saving towards. And so that dreaming portion, it is, it’s so, so critical. I mean, any great book motivator that shows you how to be better in certain parts of your life, goals are always in there. Those dreams are always in there. And so there’s the short-term dreams, have something that you’re working towards five years and less so that you can get to it quickly. And then have those dreams that are five years or more that you say, OK, out there in the future, what do I want? And then also have shared dreams. If those two dreams don’t coincide with your spouse, then have something you guys are working at together. I mean, all of this is going to be a partnership if you’re married. But I think having those dreams together is so crucial where yes, we are individuals, so my husband may have a dream to go on a hunting trip, you know, to South Dakota. That’s not my dream. That’s great if that’s his dream. It’s not my dream. So what are the dreams that we have together? And so all of that, it gives you such motivation. And it was funny, that trip we just went on last week, we had an agenda. We had like four things we wanted to talk about. But one of them was we literally set our financial dreams. One of ours was to build a house, and we moved in November of ‘19. And honestly, since then, I mean, we went through 2020, which was crazy. Now, we’re kind of on the other side saying, OK, what do we want? Besides just a number, what are the things that we’re shooting for? And just having those conversations, it’s so fun. I mean, it just brings life to you or again, if you’re married, to your marriage, just to have things that you’re working towards together. Again, it gives you purpose. It gives you purpose to save. And if there’s not purpose to save, you’re more than likely not going to do it.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, I think shared dreams, it’s so important. Great wisdom. I think especially for folks that are in the weeds and maybe frustrated with the budget or feeling like a goal is taking forever, I think some of those dreams can lift folks together and get excited behind the vision, you know, especially while there’s other things that are happening along the way. Rachel, I want to wrap up our time by talking about giving. And you make the case that giving is ultimately the antidote to fear. Why is that the case?

Rachel Cruze: There’s something about living life with an open hand where you say, “You know what, I’m actually going to give things,” because I think the opposite of that is that closed fist mentality where you’re going to just control everything and it’s all yours and it’s just all right here, and there’s a level of that that just, it gets exhausting. And there’s not joy in that. And so when you actually open your hand and give, which sounds counterintuitive, right, if I’m trying to put money towards a dream or I’m trying to put money towards getting out of debt or building an emergency fund, but I’m giving some of it away, like that just seems so backwards where in fact what it does is it fuels you. Because when you live a life that you move on the spectrum from being selfish where it is all about you to selfless where you actually see other people and you see OK, the needs that are out there, things that your money can do, even if it’s not a lot of money, but using it as a tool to help people, it changes you. I mean, it really, really changes you. And there’s nothing like it. It’s cliche to say, but it’s true. The joy that you get from giving is unlike any other joy that you can have in life. Like it gives something to you, to your soul. Because I think we were created to be givers. And when you’re living in that, it changes your perspective. And I also think selfless people have a better quality of life. I think they’re better spouses, better parents, better coworkers, better friends. You know, people that actually care about other people, it’s an amazing thing, but I think it does, it gives you a quality of life that’s so deep. And I think that it can be — obviously you can give all different kinds of ways, but your money is one of those. And when you live that life with an open hand, it does something to your soul that I think is so, so healthy in a world that is so self-centered.

Tim Ulbrich: Rachel, great, great stuff. Where is the best place that our community can go to connect with you and learn more about your work?

Rachel Cruze: Yeah, you can go to RachelCruze.com. The book “Know Yourself, Know Your Money” is anywhere books are sold. And I’m also — I have a podcast, “The Rachel Cruze Show” you can check out as well.

Tim Ulbrich: Awesome. So to the YFP community, make sure to pick up your copy of “Know Yourself, Know Your Money,” available really anywhere, also available at RamseySolutions.com. We’ve just scratched the surface during this interview. I’m confident you’ll gain so much more from digging into the book and completing the activities at the end of each chapter. In the book, you’ll discover what’s at the root of your money tendencies, including how to overcome your biggest money fears, how your childhood impacts your money decisions today, and what really motivates your spending, saving, giving, and more. Rachel, thank you again for taking time to come on the show. Really appreciate it.

Rachel Cruze: No, thanks for having me. Really, really thankful. Thanks.

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